The Hindu Business Line : Navy's `floating hospital' to set sail with medical relief

HOSPITAL Ship Brahmaputra, docked in relatively calmer waters in the western coast, will spend this new-year's eve preparing to set sail to coastal areas in India or it's neighbouring countries recently ravaged by the killer-waves.

Armed with medical and para-medical officers, surgeons, medicines and an operation theatre, Brahmaputra, the `floating hospital', can hold casualties and is awaiting instructions to move at anytime, Admiral V.K. Singh, Commanding Officer with the INHS Asvini, told Business Line.

The more than 100-year-old Indian Naval Hospital Ship (INHS) Asvini itself is just a whistling distance away from the Arabian Sea.

Three ships have already been sent from here to Male and other regions hit by the tsunami — INS Mysore, INS Nirdeshak and INS Aditya.

Brahmaputra is the fourth ship, but this has been converted into a hospital, he said.

Pitching into this effort by the Navy is the Mumbai-based drug company, Nicholas Piramal India Ltd.

"We have one plant in Chennai, just 20 minutes away from the Marina Beach and another in Colombo. Both plants have not been affected, but our staff there have got involved with the relief measures," Dr Swati Piramal, NPIL's Director Strategic Alliances, told some Navy officials present at Asvini.

NPIL is donating medicines to the Navy to be shipped to locations struck by the tsunami. The medicines donated include antibiotics, pain-relief and other first-aid requirements, an NPIL official said.

Another Mumbai-corporate who had a close encounter with the tsunami is Sun Pharma. The company recently organised loaves of bread for a camp near its factory at Maduranthakam, a company official said.

The tsunami may have largely hit the eastern coast, but it is in top-of-mind for several residents on India's western coast.

Admiral Singh says: "The earthquake near Pakistan in the past has affected this coast. The western coast may be less prone, but not immune."

Similar concerns force some professionals in India's financial capital to turn down new-year party invitations. They stay glued, instead, to their television sets for the latest on the tsunami.

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