Cruel twist: An ‘honest mistake’ leads to a miscarriage

Mother loses baby after being misinformed that her child was missing.

ISLAMABAD: One phone call can change a life. Not making one can too. Sitara Tahir, five, suffered a head injury in school and was taken to hospital to get five stitches. While children get injured at school all the time, in this case, nobody informed the child’s parents, or even the school administration. From there followed a series of unfortunate events.

While Sitara was at hospital with the teacher who took her there, the administration was out of the loop. When someone from home came to pick her up, the administration told them she was not in school.

When her mother, Nigar, spoke to a teacher, she was told that her daughter had already been picked up. When Nigar mentioned that Sitara had not reached home, the teacher said flatly, “I don’t know then,” and hung up the phone.

The shock turned out to be too much for Nigar, who was three months pregnant. She fell over and had to be rushed to hospital.

In less than two hours, coordination had been restored and the ACE International Academy administration located the child and had her sent back home. When Nigar recovered, they told her daughter was safe, but the stress had caused her to miscarry. Doctors waited for almost five hours before accepting that they could not save the life of the foetus, only the mother.

The family holds the school management responsible for the misfortunate developments.

Nigar Tahir told The Express Tribune that given her family’s political links, all kinds of worrying possibilities raced through her head when she was told “somebody” might have taken her daughter. “I thought someone had kidnapped or killed her, and the shock made me lose consciousness.”

Nigar’s husband said the shock cost them the baby. According to doctors’ reports, Sitara, had a head injury and was brought to the hospital by a teacher, where she was given five stitches.

After learning that Sitara was being treated at hospital, the school arranged for her cook, who was still waiting at the campus, to be taken there. The cook walked home with the little girl.

“No transport was arranged for Sitara by the school, and it made her condition even worse,” said Sitara’s parents.

“It was an honest mistake,” the school management said. They blamed it on a miscommunication, saying that some teachers knew about Sitara’s injury and had hid it from her mother.

The family, however, demands that the elite school take responsibility for negligence.

However, Academy In-charge Commander (retd) Ilyas refused to take disciplinary action against any official of the school, according to Sitara’s father. “I asked Commander Ilyas if it was fair to ignore such negligence, but he just scolded me and shouted ‘what I should do, burn down the school?’’

When approached for comment, Commander Ilyas expressed his grief over the incident and regretted any inconvenience caused, while refusing to share details of the inquiry’s findings.

The academy’s principal, Dr Simon, and Sitara’s teacher, Mrs Hussain, refused to comment on the issue.

Since the school is owned by Bahria Town, the private housing society’s Public Relations Officer Asif Chatta told The Express Tribune that he contacted Sitara’s father by phone and the issue is now settled.

But Sitara’s father insisted that he and his family were not satisfied with the housing authority’s investigation or apologies over the phone, saying that they had been rude and uncooperative.

Edited by Vaqas Asghar

Published in The Express Tribune, December 5^th, 2011.