It was March 15. Bollywood director-producer Satish Kaushik experienced relentless muscle pain and headache. All he wanted to do was lie down, hoping the pain would go away. “When the film industry began to bounce back late last year, I was back at work. I remember having a bad cough once back then. But it wasn’t anything serious. This time, however, my throat felt different, strange even. I was almost sure I had contracted the virus,” Kaushik tells mid-day. On March 17, an RT-PCR test confirmed he was Coronavirus positive, along with three other staff members. His wife, Shashi, tested negative. But a day later, their eight-year-old daughter Vanshika’s reports confirmed that she too had caught the infection. 

Father and daughter went into isolation in the same room of their Versova home. “She [Vanshika] was excited. She said we will watch movies and chat all day. She didn’t have any symptoms, so I was relieved. But my condition worsened by March 19. I was admitted to Kokilaben Hospital,” he tells us.

Vanshika, who was born via surrogacy when Kaushik was a cool 56, was now separated from daddy and alone in home quarantine. She was struggling to cope. “I want to sleep next to mom, I want to hug her,” she would weep, every time Kaushik’s PPE-clad manager left a meal by her bedside. By March 23, her fever began to fluctuate. 

After medical consultation, it was decided that she would be admitted to a children’s hospital in South Mumbai. “While there is a facility for COVID-19 positive children at Kokilaben, all the beds were occupied,” he remembers. And, some suburban hospitals had beds for critical children, but they lacked paediatric staff. “They need special care. It was pathetic. The only children’s hospitals I was told could manage to offer treatment were SRCC in Mahalakshmi and Wadia in Parel. But since I was recovering in a separate isolation room, I suggested that Vanshika be allowed to share it with me and the hospital agreed.”

While Vanshika was admitted on March 25, Kaushik was discharged a day later. He comes across as a concerned helpless father when he says he cannot imagine how other parents have come to terms with having to leave their children alone in isolation wards and ICUs. “Hearing her weep as she would be taken away for tests would break my heart. I’d cry with her,” Kaushik says.