Media workers outside Lilavati Hospital where Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan underwent surgery. file | Photo courtesy: Reuters
Bollywood star Saif Ali Khan, who is being treated at a Mumbai hospital after being injured in a knife attack at his home, is doing “very well” and is expected to be discharged in two to three days, doctors said on Friday. .
The 54-year-old actor, who was stabbed at multiple places including his neck, underwent an emergency surgery at Lilavati Hospital, where he was taken after he was brutally attacked at his Bandra apartment by an intruder on Thursday morning.
“We are keeping an eye on his progress and he is performing as per our expectations,” he said. As per his progress, we have advised him rest and if he is comfortable, we will discharge him in two to three days,” said Dr Nitin Dange, neurosurgeon, Lilavati Hospital.
He said a team of doctors examined him and allowed him to walk.
The actor is fit to be taken out of the intensive care unit (ICU) and “we are shifting him to a special room,” said the neurosurgeon, who led the team of doctors who operated on Khan on Thursday.
“Khan suffered three injuries, two on the hand and one on the right side of the neck. And the main part was towards the back, which was in the spinal cord, which we call the thoracic spine. “A sharp object was inserted inside, which went very deep, touching the dura and the spinal cord, but it did not cause any damage to the spinal cord,” said Dr. Dange.
He said doctors have removed the sharp object and repaired the spinal cord injury.
“he is very lucky. We repaired the leaking spinal fluid and the dura that was there. We had to carry out repairs, which were successful,” said Dr Dange.
Today when we drove it, it ran perfectly fine. He is on regular diet and that is why we have decided to shift him from the ICU to a normal special room. In view of the deep spinal cord injury, he has been advised rest. Today we will ban visitors because we want Khan to rest,” he said.
The entire family – Khan, his wife and co-star Kareena Kapoor, and their two sons, four-year-old Jeh and eight-year-old Taimur – lived in a 12th-floor apartment in the ‘Satguru Sharan’ building with five of them. Home helps at the time of attack.
In a statement to the police, Jeh’s maternal grandmother Eliama Philip, who was the first to confront the armed attacker, said he demanded ₹1 crore.
Police officials said that the intruder did not forcefully enter the actor’s flat or break into it, but probably entered with the intention of committing robbery sometime during the night.
Philip told the police that she was sleeping on the floor in Jeh’s room and woke up at around 2 am after hearing a noise and saw a man moving towards the sleeping child. Panicked, she ran to pick him up and was pushed away by the man armed with a wooden stick and a long hexa blade.
Khan, who was awarded the Padma Shri in 2010, was taken to a hospital in Bandra in an autorickshaw.
published – January 17, 2025 01:52 PM IST