ALL RELIGIONS UNDER ONE ROOF IN HOSPITAL PRAYER ROOM
Every time Prakash Singh gets stressed about the condition of his brother-in-law Harbansh Singh, he leaves the visitors’ waiting area in the hospital and goes into a prayer room where he can share his feelings with Waheguru (God).
While Mr Singh, a Sikh, is praying to his god, a Muslim, a Christian, a Buddhist or a Jew sitting nearby may be communicating with their gods.
In a novel concept, the Government Medical College and Hospital (GMCH) in Chandigarh, the capital of Punjab and Haryana states 250 kilometres north of New Delhi, has opened an exclusive room where visitors of patients belonging to different religions can pray together.
Harbansh Singh has been unconscious since Jan 24 when he had a brain stroke and was admitted to the high dependency unit (a unit between general and critical care) of the GMCH. Doctors are expected to operate on him soon.
Prakash Singh, resident of Ludhiana, 105 kilometres from Chandigarh, has been attending to his brotherin-law daily. He says the prayer facility gives him a lot of comfort and makes him feel much more composed and optimistic.
“This is a good concept and needs to be replicated in all hospitals across the country,” Mr Singh says, flanked by relatives of Christian and Muslim patients outside the prayer room.
Dr Bir Singh Chauhan, principal of the HMCH, says he got the idea for the prayer room after seeing what visitors would do when patients would be taken for operations. “We Indians have a lot of faith in God. Every time a patient would be wheeled into an operating theatre, the visitors would stand in corners and pray. We thought, why not give them a designated place for this?” Dr Chauhan told Asia Focus.
God might have different names and take different forms for people from different religions, but praying gives people hope and helps to calm them at stressful times, the doctor adds.
The air-conditioned room has half a dozen mats covered with white cotton bedsheets. An illustration displaying symbols of Hinduism, Sikhism, Islam and Christianity hangs on the front wall. Under the illustration, wooden shelf displays the principal books of the four religions.
The 813-bedded GMCH has 22 operating theatres and conducts about 4,500 major and minor operations every month. In 2016 it conducted 55,000 operations.
Besides patients from Chandigarh and nearby cities including Panchkula and Mohali, the hospital obtains referrals from other states including Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Bihar.
Dr Ravi Gupta, an orthopaedic surgeon and a sports injury specialist who operates on an average of 15 patients in a week, says the prayer room has resolved the problem of crowding in corridors during operations. “Earlier, the visitors would pray on the floor and in the corridors. Now they move into the prayer room before we switch on the lights in the operating theatre,” he says.
Dr Gupta, medical superintendent in the GMCH, once operated on the Pakistani cricketer Abdul Razzaq and later visited Lahore at the invitation of the former all-rounder.
Besides providing outpatient and inpatient care to tens of thousands of patients every month, the GMCH trains 100 graduate doctors every year, runs paramedic courses (laboratory technicians, radiology and anaesthesia technicians, etc) and also houses a nursing college.
The hospital, spread across over 18,700 square metres, is the second largest medical college in Chandigarh.
In an interview with Asia Focus, Dr Gupta said the prayer room was an expression of empathy for the patients’ visitors.
Pointing to a replica of the Hippocratic Oath hanging behind his chair, Dr Gupta said the oath that all doctors take requires them to do this and much more.
The oath, based on ancient Greek medical teachings, requires a new physician to swear upon a number of healing gods that he or she will practise medicine ethically and will do no harm or injustice to patients. In India all MBBS (bachelor of medicine and bachelor of surgery) doctors take the oath after completing their graduation.
The GMCH is the second institution in India to set aside a dedicated space where people from all religions can pray together.
The Indian Army has had a similar programme for four decades. Similar to military chaplains in the armed forces in other nations, the Indian Army recruits and trains religious teachers who not only look after places of worship on military properties but also give sermons and motivational speeches to soldiers during a conflict.
The army selects the teachers through a separate selection process and trains them at the Institute of National Integration (INI), Pune, about a three-hour drive from Mumbai. They are recruited as junior commissioned officers (JCOs) and given designations such as maulvis, pundits, granthis, priests or monks. The religious teachers are also trained in behavioural and social sciences and taught about the importance of the social fabric in a secular country like India.
The teachers counsel soldiers and also perform postdeath rituals. Every teacher is trained in performing rituals of other religions also. In case a teacher of a particular religion is not available after the death of a soldier, a teacher of another religion can perform the rituals.
The INI, set up in 1985, trains around 300 religious teachers every year.
Certain universities and airports around the world also provide multifaith spaces where students and travellers can connect with their faith.