A NEW LEASH ON LIFE

A young girl suffers brain injury; her mother determines to bring her daughter back to life through love, care, surgery and Bharatanatyam

When facing everyday problems, we cry, console ourselves and move on, says Swati Anil. “But when your daughter is lying unconscious in the ICU with brain damage, no amount of consolation or philosophising can help you. You have no time to think or curse God. Crying only drains your energy, and you need every ounce for the battle ahead.”

This was the lesson Swati learnt in March 2015, when her daughter Nirmohi Anil had a tragic accident while waiting for an auto-rickshaw in Mumbai. The mother-daughter duo had planned a celebratory dinner that night – Swati had just completed a fundraising event for the NGO where she worked, and Nirmohi had given the final paper of her second-year exam at Sophia College where she was studying psychology. An accomplished Bharatanatyam dancer, Nirmohi wanted to be a movement therapist and had been teaching dance to children in Dharavi’s slums in those days. Swati’s husband Anil and son Rahul were away – Anil for work and Rahul for studies in Australia.

The next thing Swati knew, a stranger picked up when she dialled Nirmohi’s number, and told her that her daughter was in hospital.