Security guards were deployed at the district hospital in Dhamtari, Chhattisgarh, after a gap of months, and checks of patients and the relatives accompanying them now take place before they enter the building.[1] During one check on Friday, the security in-charge found ganja in the pocket of a patient’s relative and reported it to the hospital management so that action could be taken.[1]

Ganja, tobacco, gutkha, bidis and cigarettes have been recovered from the pockets of several people during the entry checks.[1] Photographs published with the accounts show the security in-charge displaying the ganja taken from a patient’s relative.[2] Guards had earlier run a checking drive against gutkha and tobacco in an effort to make the hospital a drug-free place.[1]

Alcohol bottles were found in the hospital toilets, where some patients and relatives drank.[1] Gutkha packets and red spittle stains lay by the windows of several wards, including the women’s ward.[1] Girish Kashyap, adviser to the district hospital, said some people had damaged the toilets of the new hospital building while intoxicated.[1]

People caught with intoxicants at the hospital are handed over to the hospital police post or fined.[1] The hospital asked patients and relatives not to bring any intoxicant into the building.[1]