A doctor of courage and determination

Noel Manuel
Dimapur | August 13

Disability has a voice and the echo chimes in the hearts of those who are willing to listen to the stories of courage and determination that is synonymous to the lives of these immobile heroes. 

When 26 year old Tshiinamatho aka Simon realized that he was paralyzed below his chest after a tragic accident that almost cost him his life on January 10, 2004, there was one thought that kept ringing in his mind – the final year MBBS exams.

After six months of constant therapy at the Indian Spinal Centre, Delhi, the young Pochury doctor was back at the corridors of the Guwahati Medical University, this time though in a wheel chair, to complete his two-year stint and indeed prove that disability is only a psychological imbalance. 

Simon finally got the white degree in 2006, only to return to his home state where members from his own fraternity have hardly had anytime to entertain this courageous youngster and listen to the heart of this young lad. “I have been to several reputed people who are in the same profession and I regret to say that they all appear to busy to spare their time to listen to my desire to work,” Simon said interruptingly, while trying to get a control on his spasms, which he suffers from on a regular basis.

His family has been his greatest support, he says and adds that he is forever grateful to the RCH for having appointed him on a temporary basis at Meluri, but is yet to make his presence there due to his physical disabilities and lack of proper emergency care in case he suffered an emergency-type situation.

If one good deed deserves another, Simon surely didn’t have to end up in a situation, where the good deed almost cost him his life. Volunteering to accompany an Ao family to Dimapur, after they had lost their daughter to Leukemia, this benevolent doctor met with an accident on his return to Guwahati in the very ambulance that brought them to Dimapur. The driver and Simon’s friend were lucky to get away with injuries, but sadly Simon wasn’t.

Confined to his rented apartment in an electronic wheel chair at River belt Colony, the young cheerful doctor believes that if God closes one door, he opens hundreds of others. Maybe together, we should try opening the many other doors for Simon, so that his one desire of at least securing a permanent job can make a difference to his life and the teachings of Christianity.