New Delhi: Sushma Swaraj's tweet that she had a kidney failure and is undergoing tests for a kidney transplant is a rare, laudable disclosure in a country where the health status of ailing politicians is often shrouded in mystery and speculation.
The External Affairs Minister has in the past used Twitter as a podium to reach out to people and address complaints regarding her ministry besides offering a helping hand to those stranded in foreign shores without documents. Her latest disclosure is in line with her usage of social networks to dispense essential information.
“Friends: This is to update you on my health... I am in AIIMS because of kidney failure. Presently, I am on dialysis. I am undergoing tests for a Kidney transplant,” she tweeted on Wednesday morning, a few hours before the Parliament was to begin its winter session.
Ashok Malik, political analyst and fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, said that is was contingent on political parties, the politician or the family to make available a certain amount of information, and also on the media to not demand medical records.
“No one wants to see details of doctors' reports, but there has to be some amount of sharing,” he said. He gave the example of regular hospital bulletins issued when deceased BJP leader Pramod Mahajan was hospitalised.
In recent weeks, the prolonged stay of Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa in Apollo Hospital in Chennai had social networks abuzz with speculation because of the lack of detailed updates from the hospital.
While Jayalalithaa’s party the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) denied social media speculation, the state police arrested many for spreading rumours.
The hospital went no further than to say she was on “respiratory support” and being treated with antibiotics.
On November 13, she finally issued a statement saying she was well and taken “rebirth”.
Similarly, Delhi’s premier private hospital Sir Ganga Ram was also found wanting in dispensing details of information about Congress President Sonia Gandhi who was admitted there in August for a shoulder injury.
The hospital issued a brief bulletin every afternoon repeating details of the doctors she was treated by and the routine nature of her check-up. Her previous bouts of illnesses had media speculating on how a famous oncologist was summoned, how she visited the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York even though her party refused to give details.
“No political leader, who strides their party like a colossus, wants to look vulnerable,” said Ajoy Bose, senior journalist and author. To him, the line between the public’s need to know and a person’s privacy can only be negotiated case by case.
“A public figure’s affairs do become a matter of public concern and curiosity and the media and other political parties do have a right to probe whether it will affect the person’s ability to govern. Sushma Swaraj has nipped rumours in the bud, but the question does arise on whether she can continue as a minister. However, the probing should stop there, and the media cannot make scoops out of medical reports,” Bose said.
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