Just 14 days before he died (from TB), I had met Ravindra Patil, Salman Khan's police bodyguard who was with him when the accident took place in Bandra on September 22, 2002. Patil died on October 4, 2007.
After finding out about Patil's admission in Sewri TB hospital on September 20, 2007, I decided to meet him. But it didn't turn out to be an easy task.
The hospital being in a bad condition then, patients were all over the place, there wasn't much order. After failing to get the hospital authorities' help in locating Patil, I started my own search. And after scouring the place for 45-odd minutes, I finally found him. All this told me that nobody knew who Patil was.
I was in for another shock though — Patil's appearance. Before then I had only seen his pictures online next to Khan. Seeing him looking nothing like his earlier self, lying emaciated on the hospital bed took the wind out of my lungs.
Diagnosed with the deadly bilateral active pulmonary tuberculosis, Patil had been dismissed from service. He told me he had also been abandoned by his family and had no place to stay in Mumbai.
When I started talking to him, he first asked for money. He said the accident case had devastated his life and robbed him of his job and health. Nobody from his family and friends were coming to meet him, he told me and said that he needed money to improve his diet as he didn't like the hospital food.
Patil also said that before getting himself admitted he was roaming and sleeping on the streets, managing to get Rs50 by begging, which he had then spent on the taxi ride to the hospital. While telling me about his woes, when the conversation turned toward Khan, he just said one thing, that Salman is a good person.
Later, I spoke to Patil's brother. He, however, had a different tale to tell. Five months before he was admitted in Sewri hospital, Patil had been admitted in a hospital in Dhule, his brother said. But, apparently, he didn't stay there and returned to Mumbai on his own. His brother told me that he wasn't following the proper treatment and just asking for money from whoever came to meet him.
