TWENTY-three-year-old Rakesh Mangal of Adelphi New Scheme, Canje, Berbice who fell and injured his scrotal area in December 2012, as he was washing the walls of a school to earn cash to help his widowed mother in the home, ended up being the loser on all fronts.

But moreover, the injury he suffered when he fell has not been taken care of completely, and so he is back in the Georgetown Public Hospital (GPH) awaiting another surgery.
In December 2012, Mangal, then 21, was washing the walls of a school near his home in Canje, when he slipped, fell and landed on the rim of a 45-gallon mild steel drum (one foot in and one foot out). In the process he injured his coccyx and scrotal area and had to undergo an operation.
While in the hospital someone stole his overnight bag which contained his clothing, passport and a few dollars he had to pay for transportation to return home, and so he was without clothing and personal effects until civic-minded persons came to his assistance.
But the greatest shock he was to receive on returning home, Mangal now recalls, was that the headmistress of the school who had requested him to wash the walls and roof of the school, did not pay him a cent, and so the plans he had to make Christmas bright for his mother and siblings were all dashed. “In fact, she nor the school never even sent me an orange nor a roll of toilet paper throughout my illness,” Mangal said forlornly.
Now 23, he said he is just hoping that the injury does not affect him adversely in later days.

(By Shirley Thomas)