London, June 29: When India wicketkeeper-batter Rishabh Pant was brought into a hospital in Mumbai following grievous injuries suffered in a car crash in December 2022, the first question he asked the attending doctor was "will I be able to play again?" recalled renowned orthopaedic surgeon, Dr Dinshaw Pardiwala, who treated the superstar cricketer following the horrific incident.
Pant, while driving from Delhi to his hometown, Roorkee, on December 30, 2022 lost control of his car which crashed into a divider and caused him severe injuries.
He was pulled out of the mangled mass, and Pardiwala said, "Rishabh Pant was extremely lucky to be alive - extremely lucky."
"When he first came in, he had a dislocated right knee. He also had an injury to his right ankle, lots of other minor injuries all over. He had a lot of skin loss, so his entire skin from the nape of the neck down to his knees was completely scraped off in the process of that accident," Pardiwala told The Telegraph, recalling the brutal impact of the crash on Pant's body.
"Then getting out of the car - that broken glass scraped off a lot of the skin and the flesh from his back," he added.
The fighter in Pant endured 635 days of recovery, rehabilitation, multiple surgeries and extensive physiotherapy to make a triumphant return to professional cricket, a fight-back which has become one of the most heartwarming stories in sports.
"To be in an accident like this, where the car actually overturns and blows up, the risk of death is extremely high," said Pardiwala, days after seeing his patient in full flow, smashing the ball effortlessly and playing audacious strokes on way to scoring back-to-back centuries in the opening Test against England at Headingley.
Pardiwala said that Pant was extremely lucky to not lose blood supply in his right leg given the severity of the injuries, as it could have led to serious complications including amputation.
"When your knee dislocates, and all the ligaments break, there's a high possibility of the nerve or the main blood vessel also being injured. If the blood vessel gets injured, you typically have about four to six hours to restore the blood supply.
"Otherwise, there's a risk of losing your limb.
The fact that his blood vessel wasn't injured despite having a severe high-velocity knee dislocation was extremely lucky," said Pardiwala.
Pardiwala recalled the day Pant was brought into his hospital in Mumbai, his first question was, "Am I ever going to be able to play again? (PTI)
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