?Sergeant Charles calling section O-2? Contact North Control immediately? Saheb is still lying unattended... Inform RG Kar outpost...? The voice of the policeman was desperate.

Almost 13 hours after a fire razed 170-odd shanties at Dhopar Math, off Bidhannagar rail station, on Monday night, eight-year-old Saheb Senapati was being denied the minimum medical help at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital.

There seemed to be no hope for Saheb when father Sundar pulled him out from beneath a cot that had turned into a ball of fire.

But neighbours refused to give up. They picked up Saheb, who had sustained critical burns, and rushed him to the hospital. That was around 11.40 pm on Monday.

If the sergeant?s words were any indication, the boy had not received any medical attention till 2.30 on Tuesday afternoon.

One of the neighbours of the Senapatis, who had carried the child to the hospital, was the first to learn about the neglect.

He immediately walked up to the sergeant on duty at the hospital, in the presence of the Metro reporter, and said: ?Kono first aid-o dewa hoi ni. Aapnara jodi ektu dekhen (He is yet to be given first-aid. Will you please look into the matter?).?

Hospital superintendent Pradip Mitra admitted: ?We don?t have a burns unit. I don?t know the details of the case, but it?s a fact that we don?t have a dresser for a burn victim. Doctors are supposed to do the dressing, but the doctors in the surgery department are overworked. We are also facing a staff shortage. It is possible the boy had not received the treatment he needed.?

In the evening, Sundar said his son was finally being attended to.

?It was around 10.30 when cries outside rattled my wife. I rushed out to take a look. By the time I returned, my mother and wife had brought out all except Saheb. He had slipped from the bed, which was in flames,? Sundar recalled.