UP minister rushed to hospital after being bitten by 'rat or mole'

Uttar Pradesh Minister Girish Chandra Yadav was rushed to a hospital here in the early hours of Monday following a bite possibly by a rat or a mole, a senior official at the district hospital said.

The Minister of State for Youth Welfare and Sports, who was on a tour of the Banda district and was staying in a circuit house, is fine and left for Lucknow in the morning, officials added.

The minister woke up feeling uneasy around 3 am, suspecting that he had been bitten on the hand by an insect and was rushed to the trauma centre of the district hospital.

An examination revealed that the bite on a finger of the right hand was possibly from a rat or a shrew (an insectivorous mammal that resembles a mouse), said the district hospital’s Chief Medical Superintendent (CMS) Dr SN Mishra.

The 47-year-old minister told PTI over the phone that he doesn't know which animal had bitten him but blood was oozing from the spot of the bite.

The minister said he was asleep when he felt a sharp pain and got up.

He said accordingly he alerted his staff.

"After keeping me under observation for three hours at the Banda hospital, I was discharged after a thorough examination," he said.

The circuit house is in a forest area, leading the minister to suspect he had been bitten by a poisonous insect, he said.

The incident in the dead of the night sent the district administration into a tizzy.

On getting information, top district officials, including the district magistrate and the chief medical officer, reached the circuit house and the minister was taken to the hospital, officials said.

Yadav was in the Banda district on Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's instruction to the ministers to visit districts allotted to them to take feedback on governance at the grassroots level.

The chief minister had recently issued instructions that ministers, as well as officials, should avoid hotels and stay in government accommodations during their official visits.

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