The number of dead from botched operations in Chhattisgarh rose to 12. More than 50 women are still in hospital, 25 in very critical conditions. The same doctor operated on 83 women in five hours - less than four minutes per operation - with patients made to lie down on the floor of a clinic that had remained closed for a year.

Mumbai (AsiaNews) - All 83 women who underwent sterilisation in Chhattisgarh were operated with the same instrument, this according to reports from the 'horror clinic' operating under the state family planning programme. Meanwhile, the death toll rose to 12 with more than 50 women still in hospital, 25 in critical condition.

According to the central government's guidelines, a medical team cannot conduct more than 30 laparoscopic tubectomies in a day, with three separate laparoscopes - that means no more than 10 tubectomies with a single instrument, as each instrument needs to be properly sterilised after every operation.

In Bilaspur district, just one doctor, Dr R K Gupta, carried out 83 operations with the same instrument in five hours - less than four minutes per operation.

Dr Gupta is considered an expert in the field, so much so that he received an award from Chief Minister Raman Singh on 26 January this year for conducting 50,000 laparoscopic tubectomies.

And that is not all for the negligence goes much further. The guidelines require that sterilisations must be carried out in appropriate facilities. Instead, the operations in question were carried out at a private charitable hospital in Pendari village that had remained closed for about a year.

A witness who was present at the site said one room of the hospital was opened, and all the women were made to lie down on the floor.

Officials with the local family planning department have tried to play down the incident, explaining that this is not the first time a single doctor performs so many ligation operations.

"This figure often crosses 100," said an official, anonymous for security reasons.

Concerned about the rapid growth of the country's population, which is now approaching 1.3 billion people, the Indian government adopted a policy of free sterilisation for women who want to avoid the risk and cost of additional children.

However, women who receive this "service" tend to be extremely poor. In order to get them to undergo tubal ligation, they are offered a financial "incentive" of about 1,400 rupees (US$ 23).

Unfortunately, many of them are unaware that the operation is irreversible and they will no longer be able to bear children.

• india
• sterilisation
• tubal
• ligation
• botched
• operations