When an accident almost killed me

A page from the personal diary of Natasha Sharma

This is one of those days of my life, which I would never ever want to happen to even my worst enemy. I was in Class 2, around six years old. I used to stay at Haridwar because my father had a transferable job. My mother would come to pick me up daily from school but that day she was late and so I decided to go home by myself.

I was on my way back home and suddenly I met with an accident, by a two-wheeler. Most people think a two wheeler can’t harm much, but I was so badly injured that I was almost gone. A teenager was driving and he did not know to apply brakes. He knocked me down and dragged me for about one km, left me in a pool of blood and ran away.

My parents and passers-by rushed me to the hospital. It is said that when one gets a deep head injury, it becomes very difficult to survive if the victim throws up and I had thrown up twice. My injury was so deep; I had 18 stitches on my head, with a fractured knee and deep bruises on my body.

Doctors told my parents my chances of surviving were dim and they should be strong enough to face the truth. I was immediately taken to Delhi where my uncle was a renowned neurosurgeon. I was hospitalized there for many days and recovered very slowly. I was very small, but the impact of this accident was so bad that I still remember each and everything very clearly.

After around a month I was back to Haridwar but I had been advised complete bed rest. My final exams were about to start and I had always been a very competitive student. While I wanted to give my exams, I wasn’t allowed. My school principal and teachers who visited me advised my parents to not let me write my exams, lest I get stressed out. But I started crying and so finally I was allowed to sit alone in a separate class. I fared very well and was appreciated a lot for my courage.

Even today my teachers call me up sometimes and tell me how brilliant I was. I was very different from others and my teachers remember me for that incident even today.