The writ of pity does not run in the life of Dr. Alaknanda Vaidya. The 39-year-old city-based gynaecologist, a single mother who was paralysed below the waist following a road accident in 2010, has won a battle against an arduous posting away from her family.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has taken cognisance of her plight after the doughty Dr. Vaidya submitted an online petition campaign on Change.org, underscoring the power of social media to transform individual lives.
Mr. Fadnavis tweeted that the “needful would be done” after the online petition against Dr. Vaidya’s posting gathered a surge of momentum, being signed by more than 85,000 people.
The Chief Minister further assured Dr. Vaidya that the Director of State Health Services would get in touch with her immediately.
“Needful for your transfer will be done by tomorrow. Pls inform which officer did not consider your request. Apologies for inconvenience,” the Chief Minister tweeted late Tuesday evening.
‘Extremely heartened’ Speaking to The Hindu on Wednesday, Dr. Vaidya said she was extremely heartened that Mr. Fadnavis had taken note of her petition so promptly and relieved that the wheels of the administrative machinery to effect her transfer had begun moving at last.
The Director of Health Services confirmed that they had received a call from the Chief Minister’s Office.
Dr. Vaidya has been posted to the Silver Jubilee Government Hospital in Baramati, around 100 km from the city, away from her mother and 11-year-old daughter in Pune.
She had taken up the government job in 2015 to support herself and her daughter financially, and was selected after she cleared her exam with flying colours.
However, her elation was short-lived when she learnt of her posting to Baramati. Since then, despite requests for transfers back to the city, the order remained on the bureaucratic backburner.
Undeterred, she submitted an online petition campaign on the popular Change.org website.
“I am 90 per cent disabled and they expect me to travel 100 km everyday! I am a doctor and a single mother and I am trying to make an honest living... Six years back, my life changed upside down after an accident left me paralysed waist below,” Dr. Vaidya said in the her petition, emphasising she did not need or seek pity, but merely a rightful transfer.
