THE GOAN NETWORK | PANAJI
Last Sunday, Shankar Halarnkar (66) wasn't sure he would stay alive after the ghastly accident on the Banastarim bridge rendered him immobile and trapped in his mangled car driven by his brother-in-law.
Hours later at the Goa Medical College (GMC), he was reported by doctors to have had multiple injuries, including a damaged cervical spine which threatened to maim him and paralysed his limbs.
The Halarnkar were shattered: the thought of their family's patriarch being maimed for life haunted them.
Flicker of hope
But six days and a complex cervical spine surgery later, a faint smile of hope has returned to their faces: 'Baba' is showing movements in his paralysed limbs after having spent 48 post-surgery hours in the ICU and lying with oxygen support in a bed in the neuro-surgery ward.
Shankar was operated upon by a team of neuro-surgeons on Thursday. All has gone well, including the passage of 48 hours in the intensive care unit (ICU) partly on life support. On Saturday afternoon, he was moved to the neurosurgery ward (108) but is still on oxygen support, according to GMC Dean, Dr Shivanand Bandekar.
"I am told that he's regaining power. Slight movement has returned," Bandekar told The Goan.
The horrific mishap
Last Sunday, Shankar and his brother-in-law Raj Majgaonkar, who was at the wheel of their car, were the unfortunate victims of the accident on the Banastarim bridge in which a Mercedes-Benz SUV driven by an inebriated Paresh Sawardekar hit multiple vehicles including theirs.
Three other people were killed in the accident including the Fadte couple from Divar -- Suresh and Bhavana -- and 27-year-old Anup Karmakar, a native of West Bengal but for some years a resident in Ponda along with his family.
Bengal native
laid to rest
The Karmakars took Anup's body to their native village in West Bengal where the last rites were performed. They are expected to return to the State on Monday and return to their day-to-day lives without him, who was their sole bread earner.
Anup has a younger 18-year-old sibling studying in class XII. His father is aged 70-plus and only works a casual job at a chicken shop in Ponda.
