It was sheer luck that Dr Fayaz Shawl somehow managed to fly to UK. After creating his unmatched profile in last 37 years, he wanted to build a hospital in Srinagar. All of a sudden it became a controversy with the highly emotional American doctor accusing almost everybody including the chief minister of hanky-panky.
Instead of guiding the doctor in the ways of the system the government is working with, the officials and the politicians reacted to the plan in such a way that it indicated as if Dr Shawl was trying to resort to a racket. Privately the officials and the politicians would tell the gullible people that the doctor intends to create a five star hotel in a green belt which will have a clinic attached. They never understood what Dr Shawl’s plans were or pretended ignorance.
The hospital was not about the investment. It was about the facility. The idea ended up into a controversy. Many in Kashmir think it was a political battle because Dr Shawl has remained close to Mufti! There are many theories. One theory makes people believe that the hospital would have stopped the patient influx to Delhi’s heart shops that make significant earnings out of Kashmir’s broken hearts every year. Whatever the truth, Kashmir lost something that it is unlikely to get back, not in immediate future.
