Vayalar Ravi to be discharged from hospital Monday

CHENNAI - Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi, who is being treated at a hospital here after suffering injuries in a road accident in Liberia, will be discharged Monday, a close aide said Saturday.

However, the minister will not be able to attend parliament straightaway as doctors at the Madras Medical Mission Hospital, where he is admitted, have advised him a week’s rest.

“The minister will be discharged Monday. He is getting well, but physiotherapy still continues. He has been advised one week’s rest,” V.N. Ajayan, additional private secretary to the minister, told IANS.

The minister will be staying at a relative’s residence in Chennai for a week, he said.

Ravi met with a road accident in Liberian capital Monrovia two weeks ago during an official visit and was initially treated at the John F. Kennedy Hospital there. He was then air-lifted to Abidjan in Ivory Coast, from where he was flown back to India in a special Indian Air Force flight last week.

According to sources, the car in which Ravi was travelling also had Shamma Jain, Indian envoy to Liberia, and both were injured.