Man carries 9-year-old granddaughter's body on shoulder as hospital allegedly denies ambulance

In a tragic incident, a man was forced to carry the dead body of his nine-year-old granddaughter after a hospital allegedly refused to provide the ambulance service.

The incident happened in the Indian city of Faridabad, which is nearly 12km from the capital city of New Delhi – on Friday (14 July) afternoon. Reports say, the deceased girl - Lakshmi - was down with fever for the last two days.

Her grandfather took her to a private hospital where the staff told him that the treatment would cost around 5, 000 rupees (£59), leaving the poor man with no choice but take her to a government hospital.

The family, however, has accused that when they brought Lakshmi to the government hospital, doctors there refused to treat her and she died later. "We repeatedly urged doctors for proper medication as her body temperature rose abruptly. No doctor or nurse visited her despite the critical condition. Around 11.30am, she lost her life," the deceased's maternal grandfather Hardev said.

Soon after her death, the hospital staff reportedly asked the old man to take the body from the premises and also declined to offer ambulance service, NDTV reported.

As the grandfather had no money, he started walking towards home carrying his granddaughter's body on his shoulder, while other crying family members walked along with him.

However, the grieving family was spotted by a group of local journalists, who arranged a private ambulance for them.

This is not the first time a hospital has denied ambulance to a poor man. In August 2016, a man from the eastern Indian state of Odisha had to face similar insensitive behaviour.

The man was forced to carry his wife's dead body for 12km after the hospital allegedly refused to provide an ambulance to take the body the 60km to their village.

"I kept pleading with the hospital staff to provide a vehicle to carry my wife's body, but to no avail. Since I am a poor man and could not hire a private vehicle, I had no choice but to carry her body on my shoulder," the man had said.