Vickey Lalwani (MUMBAI MIRROR; January 9, 2014)

Veteran Bengali actress Suchitra Sen continues to be seriously ill. Subrata Maitra, who is attending to her along with a team of chest physicians and cardiologists at Belle Vue Clinic in Kolkata, told Mirror on Wednesday, “Suchitraji is conscious but bedridden. She is on a continuous supply of oxygen supplemented by non-invasive ventilation. She had a high rate of heart beat earlier but that is now under control.”

Sen, whose condition has been delicate since December 28, is still kept under observation in an Intensive Therapy Unit (ITU). Doctors have ruled out the possibility of discharging her any time soon.

The 82-year-old actress was undergoing treatment for a chest infection at a nursing home since December 23 and was taken to the Critical Care Unit (CCU) after her condition worsened on the night of December 28.

The most popular actress in West Bengal till date and one of the finest of her time, whose brush with Bollywood led to classics like Devdas, Bombai Ka Babu, Mamta and Aandhi (right), turned a recluse after she quit acting in 1978. Dubbed as the Greta Garbo of India, she has not attended any social gathering in the past 35 years. She is so fiercely protective about her privacy that she even refused the Dadasaheb Phalke Award for the year 2005 which required her to be present at the felicitation ceremony in New Delhi.

The only few people who have access to her are daughter Moon Moon Sen, granddaughters Raima and Riya and some spiritual gurus. “She guards her privacy not because of her health but simply because she is into spiritualism,” Maitra revealed.

However, in a rare exception, Sen met the Chief Minister of West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee, at the nursing home on Sunday. “The CM met Suchitraji and also had tea here. She was in the nursing home for around 25 minutes,” Maitra said.

When contacted, an anxious Moon Moon Sen said: “I can’t talk to you at length right now. I am extremely worried about my mother’s health. Riya and Raima and I are taking turns to be by her side 24x7. We want her to recover soon.”