Amaravati, AP: A tribal woman in labour pain, who had to be carried on a makeshift 'dholi' to a hospital, delivered a baby girl on a slushy road in a forest area of Andhra Pradesh.
A video of the woman's trek for about 3-4 km from one of the 10 hamlets on a hilltop in Salur mandal in Parvatipuram tribal belt of Vizianagaram district on Thursday was posted on social media by a youth, who wanted to highlight the issue of lack of roads in the village.
On coming to know that the woman was being carried in a dholi' (a palanquin made using a cloth tied to a bamboo pole) to the hospital in Salur, the Integrated Tribal Development Agency authorities sent a medical team but the woman delivered a baby girl midway.
"By the time our staff reached, the woman delivered a baby girl. Our medical team provided necessary post-natal care. The woman and the newborn are fine," ITDA project officer G Lakshmisha said on Friday.
The baby girl is the fifth child of the tribal woman.
"It's only in recent years that these villagers started coming down to the plains for institutional deliveries. There is no road connectivity to these hilltop villages but we always send medical teams in advance when we know about such cases," the official said.
In fact, the government has made available a palanquin for the villagers but they have not been using it "since it was heavy" and prefer the traditional dholi.
The government has sanctioned Rs 5.5 crore for providing road connectivity to these villages under the Centre's Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), but no contractor bid for the work because of the difficult terrain, sources said.
