JOIN USSasikala hospitalised due to breathing issues
Exactly a week before she is set to walk out of Parappana Agrahara prison, former AIADMK leader V K Sasikala was on Wednesday admitted to Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital in Bengaluru after she complained of breathing issues.
Sasikala, 69, who was brought in an ambulance from the prison, was taken inside the hospital in a wheelchair.
“Smt. Sasikala with comorbidities of hypertension, diabetes and hypothyroidism is admitted with cough and fever. On arrival to the hospital, her oxygen saturation was at room air 79 percent and febrile,” Dr Manoj Kumar HV, Dean and Director of the Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital, said.
He added that she was stable with supportive measures, antibiotics and oxygen. “She will be further evaluated and monitored. Investigation reports are awaited,” the dean said.
In Chennai, Sasikala's counsel N Raja Senthoor Pandian told Deccan Herald that the prison authorities informed him that his client had intermittent fever for the past five days and that her blood oxygen levels were monitored regularly.
“The blood oxygen witnessed a dip on Wednesday morning and that is when the jail authorities informed us of her health condition. The jail superintendent told me that my client is doing fine and her condition is stable,” Pandian said.
He added that since Sasikala complained of breathing issues, the jail authorities decided to get her examined by a team of doctors. “We were informed that she has been shifted to a hospital,” he said, adding that swab samples of Sasikala have already been taken for a RT-PCR test to check whether she has been infected with the novel coronavirus.
As Sasikala was hospitalised, her family members rushed to Bengaluru, 345 km from Chennai, by road. To a question whether Sasikala's hospitalisation will affect the date of her release, Pandian replied in the negative.
Sasikala's hospitalisation comes exactly a week before she is set to walk out of Parappana Agrahara prison after completing her four-year jail term in a disproportionate assets (DA) case. The close confidante of former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa surrendered before the jail authorities on February 15, 2017, days after her bid to occupy the Chief Minister's chair failed.