The Right Medicine

 In the sun-drenched village of Bhanjapur Sasan, where the golden rice stalks swayed to the rhythm of the breeze and the scent of wet earth lingered after dawn, life moved at a gentle, ancient pace. Children darted barefoot along dusty lanes, chasing kites and dragonflies, their laughter echoing through mango groves. Cows lowed lazily in courtyards as women in colorful sarees drew water from moss-covered wells and pounded spices with rhythmic grace. Men gathered beneath banyan trees to sip tea and debate politics or the price of fish.


Amid this tapestry of village life stood the lone hospital, a crumbling white structure that looked both neglected and authoritative. Inside it moved Dr. Kishore Kumar Rath, who held his stethoscope like a sceptre and carried himself with the self-importance of a monarch. Cloaked in his spotless white coat, he believed himself above the people he served—respected not for kindness, but for power, and masked charm.


 One humid afternoon, as the shadows of tall palm trees flickered against the walls of the village clinic, a woman came rushing through the door, half-drenched in sweat, her saree clinging to her skin. In her arms was a frail girl of about fifteen, barely conscious, her head resting limply against her mother's shoulder. Her name was Pranjali. Dr. Kishore Kumar Rath, the only doctor in the village of Bhanjapur Sasan, sat behind his heavy wooden desk, scribbling in a thick register. The scent of phenyl and heat hung in the air. He looked up from his writing as the mother burst into the room, panic in her eyes and a tremor in her voice. “Doctor babu, please! My daughter… she has had a fever since last night. It’s getting worse. She hasn’t eaten. She can’t even speak.” Without a word, Dr. Rath stood and motioned her towards the examination table. Pranjali was gently laid down, her limbs limp, her skin slick with sweat. Her breaths came in short, shallow bursts. Her eyes, half-lidded, fluttered weakly. Her lips, dry and cracked, barely moved when she tried to speak. Her mother stood nearby, wringing the end of her saree, eyes darting between her daughter and the doctor.



 Dr. Rath leaned over her and placed a hand on her forehead, then on her wrist, checking her pulse. He removed the stethoscope from around his neck and pressed it against her chest. All the while, his eyes lingered on her features—her delicate collarbone, her long eyelashes, the curve of her cheek. There was a strange stillness in the room now, a momentary hush broken only by the ticking of the wall clock and the soft buzz of a ceiling fan overhead. “You can’t be ill,” he murmured, almost to himself, his voice smooth and disturbingly calm. As he stood upright, he ran his fingers through his salt-and-pepper moustache, a habitual gesture that always accompanied his moments of thought. “You look like a beautiful butterfly. Such a beauty doesn’t fall ill.”


 The mother blinked, unsure of what she had just heard. Her instincts stiffened. There was something unsettling in the doctor’s tone, in the way his gaze hovered a moment too long, in the strange tenderness of his words. She stepped forward, placing a protective hand on her daughter’s forehead. Dr. Rath moved to the medicine shelf, his back turned to them, as he prepared a fever injection. His face, though calm on the surface, carried an expression that no mother could see—but which the walls of that clinic had silently watched before. He had lived too long in this isolated world of trust and power, in a place where patients arrived with reverence, and his word was law. Pranjali stirred slightly, murmuring something incoherent. Her mother bent close to her. Dr. Rath returned with the syringe and a vial, and his professional demeanour re-emerged. But the air in the room had already changed. Somewhere between sickness and silence, between care and something unsaid, a line had blurred.


 The words pierced through Pranjali like thorns. Her dignity burned hotter than her fever. She turned her face away in disgust, but in Bhanjapur, where choices were scarce, and power protected the wrong, she had nowhere else to go. Dr. Rath, though a married man with three grown children, kept trying to "befriend" her—sometimes with jokes, sometimes with gestures, sometimes with veiled threats. No one dared to confront him. He was the doctor. But Pranjali’s condition worsened. She couldn’t escape his clinic. The fever clung to her, the medicine barely worked, and the humiliation multiplied. That was when the young men of Bhanjapur Sasan stepped in. They had grown up watching this man misbehave with girls, with widows, with patients too afraid to speak. They had been silent too long. Now, enough was enough.

 One night, as Dr. Rath was returning from his “evening rounds,” riding his aging scooter along the lonely road that curved past the banyan tree, something unexpected happened. A long bamboo pole suddenly crashed across the road in front of him. Startled, he skidded and fell. Before he could recover, masked figures stepped out of the darkness. Not a word was spoken. The blows fell like rain—iron bars, steel rods, precise strikes. His legs broke, his joints dislocated. The pain was unbearable, his screams echoing into the silent night. The village slept—or pretended to. He lay there till dawn.



 A passing farmer eventually spotted him and called for help. He was rushed to Kendrapara District Hospital, but the damage had been done. The proud, arrogant doctor who once stood tall now lay in bed—an invalid forever. He would never walk again, never trap another butterfly, never rule over another sick soul.


 Meanwhile, the young men took Pranjali to SCB Medical College in Cuttack, where she received proper treatment. Her fever faded, her strength returned—and so did her dignity.

 In Bhanjapur, no one talked about what happened that night. But they all knew.Dr. Kishore Kumar Rath had finally received the right medicine.And this time, it worked.