The health condition of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee continues to remain critical and he is on life support systems, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences said in a statement on Thursday morning. This followed a similar announcement on Wednesday evening.
“Both his lungs are not in good condition because of pneumonia on both sides and his kidneys are also weak,” an unidentified official at the hospital told PTI.
The veteran Bharatiya Janata Party leader’s condition has been worsening since Tuesday. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union ministers Piyush Goyal and Smriti Irani, and several other leaders visited the All India Institute of Medical Sciences on Wednesday evening and night to enquire about Vajpayee’s health. Modi also visited the leader on Thursday afternoon.
Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu, and Vajpayee’s former deputy LK Advani visited AIIMS on Thursday morning to enquire about the former prime minister’s health. Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Union minister Prakash Javadekar are expected to visit the hospital soon, reported ANI.
BJP President Amit Shah, Union Health Minister JP Nadda and Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh are already at the hospital. Nadda said doctors were doing their best and that the hospital will put out a new bulletin soon.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said she had cancelled her work to visit the ailing leader on Thursday. “I got chance to work with him. He is a statesman-like figure,” she told ANI. “We supported him when his govt was falling. His pattern of work was different and not like present politics.”
The former prime minister was admitted to the facility in June with a urinary tract infection, a lower respiratory tract infection and kidney-related ailments but the hospital had said days later that he was recovering.
The BJP veteran is a diabetic and has one functional kidney. He had suffered a stroke in 2009, which reportedly weakened his cognitive abilities, following which he developed dementia.
Vajpayee was the prime minister between 1998 and 2004 when the National Democratic Alliance government was in power. The government conferred the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian honour, on him in 2015.
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