Speculation is rife about Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s health, and the secrecy surrounding it raises the issue of the right to privacy versus the public interest.
AN ambulance pulled up at the entry to the emergency room (ER) of the Apollo Hospitals on Greams Road in Chennai on September 22 around 8:45 p.m. The ER responders wheeled the patient, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, into the facility. She was unconscious and had to be resuscitated, said two sources, independent of one another. With her in the ambulance was her trusted aide, Sasikala. Her secretary for all practical purposes, Poongundran, who followed in a vehicle behind, was at the ER.
There was some surprise as the patient was wheeled in. This was because the first call from Veda Nilayam, the Poes Garden residence of Jayalalithaa, was not to Apollo because it was too risky—too many people would have known of the Chief Minister’s arrival and security needed to be taken care of.
The first call was from a seasoned medical professional in Poes Garden to Preetha Reddy, Apollo’s most familiar face and the well-regarded daughter of its founder, Dr Prathap C. Reddy. Despite her recent change in designation to vice chairperson, Preetha Reddy remains the point of contact for most of the city’s elite and is known to be accessible, helpful, discreet and dependable. She asked for an ambulance to Cathedral Road but did not disclose the destination to the driver. But, as the vehicle made its way on Cathedral Road, the destination was given to the driver.
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