By 2003 Rashmi had become increasingly concerned about my behaviour. I had been spending a great deal of money sending Faxes and making telephone calls to organisations such as the courts and other parties. We frequently had arguments at home and I would not budge from what I was doing because I truly believed that I was working in accordance with God's wishes. I swore at her calling her kutia (bitch), materialistic moron, and achut (untouchable) for breaking my concentration (dhyan).
During the early period I had deja vu like symptoms in almost everything I did, most importantly in the letters I wrote and I began believing that I was destined to fight out a major battle of reputation in this country. In my twenties while asleep at night I used to experience a sudden sucking up of my mental faculties as if I was entering a dangerous dark hole in the cosmos from which there would be no escape, and I had to shake myself to wake up to end this sensation; I may also have dreamt parts of the experiences of the current struggle during that time. I had even day dreamed that I would one day receive the Bharat Ratna from India for my work.
I had spent my childhood in the city of Allahabad, one of the holiest cities of India for Hindus; among sadhus taking part in Kumbha Mela. I had also then attended a Christian missionary school. I wore a necklace with the murti of Ganesh which was given to me by my step mother for the removal of obstacles in my life. These were surely the preparations that I needed for the major task that I was now faced with. I started studying numerous books on history and religion and especially the works of Swami Vivekananda and Sri Aurobindo. In particular Sri Aurobindo's life was remarkably similar to what I was going through in that he fought the British tooth and nail. My eyes were attracted to the words jnana yoga in a publication one day as if some power was pointing to me that this is what I was. I also felt that the Almighty Divine had made an interjection in the affairs of men through me and I simply had to follow every line that I was being led into. Reading a line in Gooberz by Linda Goodman that I purchased for my sister Soumya, 'Did you not see the Kent State coming', I felt that this saga had been prophesied.
I had been led to believe that God is everywhere, in everything. Vishnu was the all pervading Immanent Universal Principle. Everything had therefore to be questioned and analysed. In particular I was drawn towards:
Yada Yada hi dharmasya glanirbhavati bharata
Abhyuthanamdharmasya tadatmanam srjamyaham
Parithranaya sadhuna vinashayaya cha dushtkrtam
Dharmasansthapnarthaya sambhawami yuge yuge
(Whenever virtue subsides and wickedness prevails I manifest myself. To establish virtue, to destroy evil, to save the good, I come from Yuga to Yuga)
My father had throughout our childhood chanted religious slokas to us, studied astrology in his spare time and read the Gita avidly right up to old age. He taught us Oriya religious songs (bhajans), a particular favourite of mine went something like, 'Gyandata bhagabana, diyo mote subhobuddhi diyo dibbyo gyana, Satapathe, dharmapathe gheni jao, mote' praying for wisdom, knowledge and truth path. My favourite film was Baiju Bawra excerpts of which I watched over and over again, singing the song, 'Mana tarapata Hari darshan ko Aaj' a devotional bhajan to Sri Krishna.
I had accidentally come across the book, Diagnosis of Man by Kenneth Walker (1943) in a second hand book shop and studied it thoroughly to consider whether I was a mystic to whom all the necessary books had been provided by the Almighty to develop my knowledge and understanding of God in order to learn of hitherto hidden secrets. 'Krishnamurthy, the Years of Awakening' by Mary Lutyens, 'Sri Ram Charit Manas', The Bhagavad Gita, and 'Ramayan of Valmiki' English translation by Ralph T.H. Griffith were other such books that I read avidly. Why else would these books have come to my possession by various means over the years if these were not for the divine purpose that I might now be engaged in, I wondered. I studied numerology from Linda Goodman's 'Star Signs' and The Cheiro Book of Fate and Fortune and became convinced that the Divine spirit manifested Itself through the numbers 3, 6 and 9 and God Himself was represented by the number 7. An examination of my birthdate being the number 15 and the spelling of my name that came to a 3 and 9, or 3 in total merely added to the positive analyses. Such facts as the number of the house we lived in, being a 3 and before that a 96, were other elements that proved that I was a selected person to fight the British in a major battle. I associated the symbol Om with the number 3 and Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu as 6, 7 and 8 respectively, or an average of 7: Almighty God, Sri Krishna, 7, the personal God was the Trimurti Trinity, or all three Gods in one, and not an incarnation of Vishnu alone as Hindus believed. Love, creativity and truth came from Brahma whereas Vishnu was the Harmoniser and the Saviour; Shiva the Destroyer. Durga, the Shakti goddess, was the female Supreme Diety. All in all I became convinced that the universe was governed according to numerological principles with the divine being associated with the numbers 3, 6 and 9 and the evil one being 2, 4 and 8, with the number 5 being a channel of one-to-one communication with the spiritual world. The Absolute Reality or the Impersonal God, unknowable, was the Brahman.
My numerological theory gradually led to the practice of using clock times to check myself against each and every act that I was performing. If the digital clock showed 3, 6 or 9 it meant that I had to act in some particular way to thwart the courts and my opponents with whom I was waging a war. The next stage was to then identify precisely what needed to be done and this was determined by taking a written piece of an action to a clock when I did not know the time: if a positive number was indicated it was precisely the right thing to do with a negative number giving the opposite answer. I was in consultation with God who was an Infallible Power on the basis of Sri Aurobindo's writings in 'The Supramental Manifestation upon Earth'. Accordingly, not following the indications would have meant going against the wishes of God, so that there was no alternative for me. There were instantaneous rewards for the mind too, as the true situation was being revealed from each check and the darkest corners of my mind were being enlightened. Truth was liberating but it proved to be a mind-blowing exercise and soon enough I was suffering from a kind of tinnitus which lasted for at least a year. Such was the intensity of my search that I felt I had discovered the ultimate knowledge of how to be at one with God through advaita. This type of search became a way of life: it was a search for the truth with Truth being God, or the Ultimate Reality. I was practicising Brahmanism by merging with the Supreme Power.
I studied books like The Splendour that was Egypt, and Ancient Romans, and read about Ghengis Khan and his tribes, the Vikings, and Marco Polo's travels to Kublai Khan's China, Indian history, the slave trade and how shipping was developed by the Europeans to conquer and colonise the world. This greatly increased my general knowledge of history, which was being provided by the Almighty.
I used to pick up coins found in the street considering these to be 'pennies from heaven' messages. The other habit that I developed was in insurmountable urge to write everything down, from what was happening during telephone conversations with anyone to the purchases we were making in shops, what Rashmi was doing, what Rupa was doing, what the courts were up to, and what televison advertisements were being shown. Writing down was an expression of the truth as I was experiencing it, and was there for reference purposes as a guide to the truth later.
The state authorities had been engaged in harassing me as was evident from the hanging basket that was stolen from our house in the summer of 1999. When I purchased a computer from the Dell Company it came without the AOL internet connection to stop me from sending emails and with hidden messages on the hard disk such as the names of a former colleague (Danny Romney) and our neighbours in Didcot to show that the company was manipulated to harass me. The Strachan School of Motoring used to pop up outside our house from time to time as if sent by the Scottish brigade with whom I had fought to annoy me.
Many of the televison advertisements were, I saw, the result of manipulation of the companies to persecute me, in particular the Sun Life AXA Life Insurance and Cornhill Senior Security Plan advertisements which were veiled threats to my life. The White Stuff: Are You Made of It' milk advertisements were racist in nature, to convey to me that this society was meant for only white people. British Gas advertisements were similarly meaningful in that they conveyed some message to me; P and O Ferries advertisements were designed to intimidate me into going for asylum in France and ROC we keep our promises advertisement gave the impression that I will be put into prison soon. British Gas was harassing me with its service too and so were other companies like Budweiser with its 'True' advertisements. It had led me to writing a letter to British Gas full of inuendo on 30 September 1999. I had shifted our electricity supply from Seaboard Energy to British Gas because Seaboard Energy was harassing me with Televison Advertisements. I wrote: PAYMENT AREA 15 CLUB REPORTS: energy bill, meters and central heating service contract As a loyal member of the Payment Area 15 Gas Consumer Club I am hereby reporting ‘total satisfaction’ to Head Quarters for having transferred our electricity supply to British Gas earlier this year and resisting Temptations to move our gas supply to cheaper Opposition attempting Takeover Bids. Sir, I considered us to be duty-bound to strengthen the Club by lumping together as many household activities under the British Gas Roof having regard for British Gases networking arrangement particularly with Sainsbury’s own loyalty Reward Club membership. I lookout for your next Newsletter for details of High Command’s other networking arrangements particularly concerning Transport, so that the Club goes from strength to strength and we can all retire at younger ages from active employment because of the rewards High Command brings the troops. Bravo Sir, we sing ‘songs of praises’ for you once again as British Gas rises like a Phoenix from a punctured balloon that it had become. So from the home front of operations I am happy to report to High Command that the recent changeover made no difference to the quality of energy supply nor of consumption but the streamlining involved did improve operational efficiency. And it will be remiss of the Club not to congratulate itself for recognising that the saga was to provide all with a heaven-sent opportunity to study the long-forgotten civil service mechanisms of the various components of British Gas Works globally (and in considerable detail too if I may add) as we turn the Millennium and ponder on the implications of this real-life elucidation of our ‘New World Order’ Establishment. May we therefore be pardoned Sir at Payment Area 15 for our present Club exuberance in admiring your continued conglomerational success and for the troops to take liberty (briefly only Sir!) to salute High Command unsolicited for its aspirations to becoming the No 1 International Gas Production Company. At this end of the Chain of Command and like a True Blue Brit Leo I promise to move Heaven and Earth for the total domination of British Gas: long live the Union, Sir – here is my Ode to commemorate this monumental effort:
Marching upwards and onwards - as a Parcel Force we ply
Airing Waves Concordant; sending lawmen awry
Expending more-on troops; with ‘Union Jacks’ high
Dispensing millions to ‘Tally ho’ - the Huntsperson’s cry
I related an article in the Daily Express entitled, 'Sorry for the Delay' as being expressed from the Prime Ministers office and this was a proof that Mr Tony Blair was aware of my plight and was promising to do something about it behind the scenes. I wrote everything down to the point that I developed repetitive stress disorder in my right wrist. Rashmi saw both my behaviour of telephoning and sending letters and of writing my experiences, for I could not hide these from her, and she complained to my father in Kolkata about it. Money was draining away at the same time. We had savings of nearly £20,000 at one point and this long struggle with the courts without any Social Security Benefits coming in took our savings down to zero where Rashmi had to borrow money to make ends meet.
At times I felt that I was living in the land of demons (rakshases) much as Ram found Himself facing in Lanka. Each one of their troops had to be engaged with and countered as I had done while still at the University of Greenwich. Rashmi did not know what I was doing of course but my endless phone calls and Faxes drove her to such a point that she saw my General Practitioner Dr Sudhir Patel to have me committed to hospital to assess and cure my mental illness as she saw it. She had warned me that hospital staff were coming to get me on 23 March 2004. I felt that she had been plotting against me behind my back with Dr Patel to have me institutionalised. For this reason I had to escape and so on the morning of the day of their arrival I did all the normal clock time checks and came to the conclusion that the Almighty wanted me to leave the house and head for Dover with a view to going to France under my asylum application to that country. My old passport had been returned to me with the cover edges cut but I had not yet been sent a new one which I took as continued persecution by the state. I decided I had to try and use the old passport to go away, except that my clock checks had revealed that I would not be actually getting on a boat to France that day. I was merely to have the passport renewal issue raised as a query at Dover Docks and pursue the matter of asylum in France.
I took the train to Dover with a few belongings and arrived there early afternoon. I explained to the Dover authorities that I had a letter from the French Refugee organisation (OFPRA) to effect my asylum in France. However the Dover Police in charge insisted that my passport was not valid to travel on. I hung around the Docks for 15 minutes and the man came up and started quizzing me. I gave my wife's name and home telephone number to him. He telephoned and spoke to my wife and got to know the full picture of the visitors that were to come and assess my mental condition. The next thing that happened was that I was bundled into the back of a police van and taken to the Scarboro Ward of the Arundel Unit of William Harvey Hospital, Ashford, Kent, where I was assessed by 2 doctors, to whom I talked about Brahmanism. I was detained under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act. That day I was given Haloperidol and Olanzapine medication by force. Prompted by another patient who gave me details of the Mental Health Review Tribunal I applied for it immediately as I was angry at being detained. On 24 March 2004 I wrote to the Hospital that I have appealed against my unlawful detention there and did not accept any treatment at the hospital. I wish the Mental Health Review Tribunal to be instituted immediately for recommendations on how this matter must proceed.
Within a couple of days I was transferred (not on my request) to the Shelley Ward of Medway Maritime Hospital under Consultant Psychiatrist Dr Isaac Sundeep, so that I could be close to my family. I absconded twice from the Ward and came home only for the police to be sent to return me to the Ward, once under handcuffs. I did not cooperate with the hospital authorities in the diagnosis of my mental state nor in taking any medication and stated that I was a political detainee. I went on a hunger strike which however lasted barely half a day. Throughout the period of my stay I was maintaining a minute by minute diary. At that point, due to my non-compliance with medication and risk of absconding from the ward the authorities decided to put me in a secure ward and I was transferred to the Willow Suite of Littlebrook Hospital, Bow Arrow Lane, in Dartford. There I was forced on to medication sometimes through injection by force. I was under the charge of a male Indian doctor Professor Mathews and his assistant Dr Yogendran, a female Indian doctor. They wanted to give me electroconvulsive therapy presumably because they suspected schizophrenia but Rashmi did not give them the permission to do this. (My elder brother suffered from chronic schizophrenia since his late teens and had received electroconvulsive therapy in India).
The Mental Health Review Tribunal met on 6 April 2004, for which I had a solicitor appointed in the person of Ms Anna Turnbull-Walker to represent me. She did not attend the Hearing which was therefore adjourned. The written report of the President of the Tribunal stated that 'the legal and medical members went to the Ward to explain this to the patient. He refused to stop writing a verbatim account of events and refused to listen to the explanation. A nurse was called upon to witness what took place and to attempt to explain to the patient later. The patient became extremely aroused and angry and made reference to clear delusional beliefs that the tribunal members were part of a conspiracy against him by the British Government.' On 7th April 2004 I received a letter that I was now being detained in accordance with Section 3 of the Mental Health Act 1983 which allowed the Hospital to detain me for up to 6 months. I applied for another Mental Health Review Tribunal and a Hearing was arranged for 14 April 2004. I wrote to the Charge Nurse that Ms Anna Turnbull Walker should receive up to 1500 documents from 3 Hoath Lane, Wigmore, Nr Gillingham, for the purposes of the Tribunal.
When the hospital authorities mentioned something about Rashmi, I responded by saying that I was going to divorce her (in view of her harassment of me at home and for arranging behind my back to get me hospitalised for a mental illness) but it was a tactical statement to protect our interests at the time, as I was fighting the enemy, the British State. I spent my time playing pool and scrabble with other patients and the nurses. I took care of my personal hygiene and ironed my clothes because I considered that personal cleanliness was a prerequisite to meeting God. On 10th April I telephoned the Royal Courts of Justice and spoke to the Duty Judge's assistant Mr Sherwood asking for a court injunction to stop the staff from injecting drugs into me. On 12 April 2004 I wrote to the Hospital Managers asking the grounds on which I was being detained in Little Brook Hospital following the period of observation that commenced on 23 March 2004, and on 14 April I applied to the Hospital Managers to let me leave hospital. A medical report was produced in which I was reported to be 'acutely psychotic with paranoid and persecutory ideation and elective mutism'. Further, 'on assessment of his mental state on 5 April 2004 he stated that he was brought to Willow Suite due to a conspiracy from No 10 Downing Street and Tony Blair. He believes that it is an attempt to silence him because he has written to several international bodies to express his dissatisfaction over the way that Muslims have been treated. He further described how television programmes had made reference to him and how when he saw an advert on the television for Andrex toilet tissue he knew that it meant that Prince Andrew was involved in his affairs. Under recommendations it stated that Mr Panigrahi is currently acutely psychotic with well systematised persecutory and paranoid delusions. In addition he has ideas of reference and delusional perception. He does not have insight into his illness, he does not think that he is mentally unwell and has so far refused oral medication. Considering his non-compliance with medication so far, and his lack of insight into his illness, it is unlikely that he will comply with medication or with in-patient treatment if he is an informal patient. He is currently being detained in the interests of his own health. We therefore recommend a further period of detention under the Mental Health Act 1983. On the basis of this report the Tribunal decided not to discharge me from Section. It stated that 'despite explanations, the patient was confused about the nature of the hearing. Throughout the hearing the patient queried Ms Turnbull Walker's competence and he asked for leave of absence from hospital to go to the High Street to appoint a solicitor of his own choice. He wanted legal representation but did not accept that a solicitor on the panel could represent his interests. The patient's evidence was that he is being systematically persecuted by the British government and that the tribunal hearing was itself part of that conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. He said that the Tribunal was unlawfully convened as the members had changed since the last hearing. We concluded from his evidence that, as stated by his clinical team, the patient is suffering from mental illness and in urgent need of medical treatment. The patient clearly had no insight into his condition and, as he is non-compliant with medication in hospital, treatment could not be provided otherwise than in a hospital setting, for the present under detention under the Mental Health Act 1983. We accepted the medical evidence that without treatment the patient's health would deteriorate and his safety would be at risk. When notified of the tribunal's decision the patient said that he did not accept it as this tribunal is unlawfully convened and he wanted access to a High Street solicitor. The tribunal was satisfied that throughout the hearing the solicitor representing the patient's interests had done so competently'.
I had gone into elective mutism mode when it suited me in order to protect my interests for I knew that anything I said could be written down and held against me as evidence of severe mental illness. An appointment was made for me to undergo a CT Brain scan and to take a blood test. I refused to take part in those tests for I still considered myself unlawfully detained by the State and I wished to preserve my mind and health as God-given. There was still the Hospital Managers Appeal to take place, and I asked Professor Mathew for a copy of his report on me. On 7 May 2004 I wrote to Mr Mark Amos Deputy Ward Manager that they have discriminated against me on racial grounds in releasing other patients ahead of me from Willow Suite Hospital, citing the cases of two patients Mr John Ashdown and Mr Paul Maynard as evidence. Reluctantly, I started taking the medication voluntarily for they would have injected it into me otherwise. Soon afterwards there was talk that I would be discharged from Willow Suite or be sent back to the open ward of Shelley Ward, and a Care Plan was worked out accordingly. I wrote saying that I was therefore cancelling my request for a Manager's Appeal listed for a hearing on 20 May 2004. On 26 May 2004 I received a letter stating that an Order of Discharge dated 26 May 2004 was received by the Managers of this Hospital removing the authority for detention under Section 3 of the Mental Health Act 1983, and that I was now classed as an informal patient. I signed a statement that I agreed to remain in the Willow Suite as an informal patient until a bed is found for me in the open ward. On 27 May 2004 Rashmi came to the hospital and drove me home.
On 28 May 2004 I wrote to the Mental Health Review Tribunal asking it to clarify the restrictions that I was subject to in writing. No reply came. On 2nd June 2004, with Rashmi's encouragement, I went into Shelley Ward of Medway Maritime Hospital. A disagreement developed as to whether I could go home whenever I wanted to and I was promptly placed back under Section 3 of the Mental Health Act by Shelly Ward. I appealed to the Hospital Managers against my detention. A Hearing was held and Ms Natasha Spreadborough, a colleague of Ms Anna Turnbull Walker, attended on her behalf and argued my case. The result was that I was discharged from Section 3 on 25 June 2004. On 28 June 2005 I was finally allowed to go home after receiving a depot injection. I could not wait for this day as the nightmare was finally over but I was to remain an outpatient.
Ms Janine Hudson a Mental Health Social Worker had been appointed as my Care officer under the Care Plan and she visited me at home and looked set to be making a habit of it. I quickly disposed off her services and made myself solely an outpatient of Dr Sundeep at Kingsley House, Balmoral Road, Gillingham, Kent. I applied for and received Disablilty Living Allowance of £31.10 per week. Dr Sundeep left the service and for a brief period a temporary Consultant came to take his place. Then a Dr B. Irala was appointed.
Soon after my return home from hospital I was seeking employment but could only get menial jobs. I had a better job offer from Kent Police for the role of Public Enquiry Officer but Dr Irala had been requested to write a medical report on me by Kent Police. With only one appointment with him, his report was naturally based almost entirely on the contents of his file on me. His report is as follows.
Personal history:
Born in India from a normal delivery. His development and milestones were normal. His childhood was uneventful. He attended primary school in India. He finished high school in India and took 5 O level and 3 A level examinations. He went to University to study Agricultural Science. However, he gave up his studies after 8 months. He worked as a scientist for 18 years and his employer was the University of Greenwich. However, he was made redundant in March 1988 because of a disciplinary reason and court proceedings are still in progress. He took his employer to court. In 2002 he started applying for asylum in many countries.
He got married 20 years ago and has a daughter. He describes his relationship with his family as supportive.
Family history:
Mr Panigrahi's mother suffered from a long standing, psychotic illness characterised by delusional belief, she believed she had Tuberculosis, despite no medical evidence. She committed suicide to prevent her children from being infected.
Mr Panigrahi has 1 brother and 2 sisters. His brother is suffering from schizophrenia and is undergoing treatment in India.
Drug and Alcohol history:
He denied using illicit drugs but there is a history of Cannabis, 3 or 4 joints in 1982. He drinks alcohol occasionally and he stopped smoking 15 years ago.
Past Psychiatric History:
Apparently he was well up until 9 years ago when he started having recurrent arguments with his colleagues and bosses. He was dismissed from his job as a scientist. At that time he consulted a psychiatrist privately. He was diagnosed as suffering from depression and was prescribed Sertraline, then St John's Wort. This he took for a few months then stopped. During this time he sued his previous employer and has been harbouring a fixed belief that the British Government is against him. He believed that there was an administrative ploy to harass him and eventually eliminate him. He continuously contacted the judiciary to protect him and his family. He misconstrued innocent events as evidence of plot.
His wife denies any threat ever existed. To avoid this pursuit, threat and harassment he has been applying for Political Asylum in various countries, but so far has been rejected. He believes the rejection is due to British influence on international politics. He was trying to escape to France but was arrested because of his expired passport.
Present Mental Health:
On 23 March 2004, Mr Panigrahi was detained under Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983, at Dover Docks when he attempted to travel to France to apply for asylum there on an expired passport. He was admitted to William Harvey Hospital, Ashford under Section 2 of the MHA 1983. He was later transferred to Medway Maritime Hospital.
At that time he believed the government was against him and making it difficult for him to live here. As a result of receiving a stained letter he believed that the government had targeted him for assassination and that the British government and the police were persecuting him. During his admission to Medway Hospital he absconded twice, and was brought back by the police. He also went on hunger strike in protest at being detained in hospital. He referred to himself as a political detainee and recorded all conversations he had and any comments addressed to him by the staff. He was also intimidating towards the staff, verbally abusive and threatening. This combined with non-compliance with medication, and absconding risk resulted in him being transferred to a secure psychiatric unit. During his admission to the Willow Suite, he remained non-cooperative. He refused to attend the ward round review on 1 April 2004, stating he was a political detainee and refusing contact with staff stating that any medication given could be a way to kill him. During further attempts to assess his mental health staff could not formally hold him. He would not speak and there was no eye contact. He documented all that was said to him. He refused prescribed medication for 4 days and when asked to have a routine blood test stated that this was continuation of attempted murder and he was recording everything to present to Northampton County Court.
5 April 2004, he said he had been brought to the Willow Suite because of a conspiracy from 10 Downing Street and Tony Blair. They were trying to silence him because he has information regarding the way Muslims are treated. He believed that television programmes made reference to him and that Prince Andrew was involved in his affairs.
After 4 days he was willing to take Olanzapine.
On the sixth week of his admission to the Willow Suite he began to show some improvement and slowly gained insight. Eventually he was transferred to Shelley Ward, Medway Maritime Hospital. Again his medication was reviewed. He responded well to treatment and was later encouraged to go on leave. His leave went well and he was finally discharged from the ward. Following his discharge from hospital he was followed up in the Out patient clinic and he maintains regular contact. He showed continuous improvement from his psychotic episode and was compliant with his medication.
During his last review his mental state was euthymic mood and reactive affect. His speech was normal in rate, rhythm and volume, spontaneous and coherent. He denied any active thoughts and delusions. He denied any abnormal perceptions. He was well oriented to time, place and person. He had gained insight into his illness and accepted that whatever happened in the past could have been a false belief and there was no plotting against him. He has realised his mistakes and his judgement was clear.
Diagnosis:
ICD 10 - F22.0 -- Persistent Delusional Disorder
Prognosis:
In my opinion Mr Panigrahi has been suffering from Persistent Delusional Disorder for a period of approximately 9 years. Although he suffers from a psychiatric illness which requires long term medication, he has shown remarkable recovery from his last episode of a psychotic break down and has maintained improvement for one and half years and is compliant with his medication. His prognosis is variable subject to his involvement in his care plan and it is difficult to predict his response when he takes on a regular, responsible job, as he has been off work for a long time and is currently doing a part time job. However, he seems quite interested in returning to work, which definitely has therapeutic benefits. He is likely to maintain his normal mental state if he continues with the present medication and accepts input from the secondary mental health services.
Kent Police withdrew the offer of the job as Public Enquiry Officer after reading this report. I wrote back to Dr Irala copied to Kent Police as follows: I received a copy of the Medical Report you wrote on me which has directly led to the withdrawal of the job offer made to me by Kent Police. In this letter therefore I wish to draw your attention to inaccuracies in your report so that you may amend these should another request be received by you in the job search that I have undertaken. Most importantly I should stress that in 1998 the diagnosis of Dr Rao (Consultant Psychiatrist at BUPA Hospital) whom I saw on my request was 'Severe Depression with Psychotic Features'. I believe in his diagnosis. I am surprised that you do not have this in your records. I did not give up my University studies. I went to University of London and completed my BSc in Pharmacology in 1978 with an Upper Second Class Honours degree which, incidentally, should give you an idea that I have some knowledge of medicine. I completed my PhD from Reading University in 1988. Much later I studied Agricultural Science as a MSc and completed 6 out of 7 course units, the 7th unit being a dissertation that I have witheld from Wye College because it was one of the organisations involved in the harassment that I suffered in the University of Greenwich prior to my dismissal under the false charges of gross misconduct. Medway County Court is not proceeding with my case against the University of Greenwich, according to the latest information that I have: I consider this to be most unfair but there is nothing I can do. I consider my detention under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act to have been due to an unfortunate misunderstanding with Dover Dock's Police. However, please note that against the wishes of the Consultant Psychiatrist, the Hospital Managers released me from the Section 3 that had later been imposed by Willow Suite and Medway Hospital.
Dr Irala replied that although you think that detention of you under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act was an unfortunate misunderstanding with Dover Dock's Police, I would like you to know that detaining somebody under the Mental Health Act requires two doctors, one of which should be a Section 12 Mental Health Act approved doctor, to agree on that day that, that individual suffered from mental illness of a nature or degree which makes it appropriate for medical treatment in a hospital under detention in the interest of patients own health and safety and also relies on an Approved Social Worker to make an application to detain that individual under the Mental Health Act which was done in your case on that day. As per the Hospital Manager's releasing you from Section 3 Mental Health Act even against the wishes of the Consultant Psychiatrist, it only means that on that particular day you were not in a position which required further detention and does not make your detention under the Mental Health Act in the first instance an unfortunate misunderstanding.
I wrote back, prompted by Rashmi: Thank you for your letter dated 24 October 2005. I am sorry for questioning your judgement and views but please try to understand that my job offer was withdrawn as a direct result of your report and that was deeply upsetting for me as I had already passed the interview and was looking forward to resuming normal life. You are involved in my case and I have every trust that you want me to be normal. You said yourself that most of your patients are in employment. Yet my case is completely different. After one and half years of non-stop search for work, I have found a part-time job as a cleaner. The job with Kent Police was my last hope of a decent job and that has been snatched away after their Medical Officer went through your report and decided that the nature of the job will make my illness return. The role of a Public Enquiry Officer requires me to deal with public enquiries in person and by writing. I do not see how this is going to make me ill. I would be grateful if you could let me know what your views are. If you agree with him I will then resign to a life of inactivity rather than hoping for a normal life with a purpose. You may wish to copy your letter to Dr P Paciorek, Occupational Physician, Kent Police, which will help them with my appeal for reconsideration. You have said that having a job will be therapeutic and I strongly agree with this. Dr Htike of Shelley Ward told my wife that the prognosis for a person in my condition (whose illness was due to a major upsetting event such as job loss, and who is above 40 years of age and has family support) is always good and the way I feel now only accentuates his view.
Dr Irala replied that he had given his report and his opinion to Kent Police and there is nothing more he could add in this regard. I wrote the the Head of West Kent NHS and Social Care Trust that following recent correspondence culminating in Dr B Irala's 1 November 2005 dated letter to me it is clear that Dr Irala is not sympathetic towards me and does not have my best interests at heart to be able to continue to serve as my Consultant Psychiatrist. As such I require a change of my psychiatrist. The psychiatrist was changed but it was not clear to me if this was as the result of my request or merely due to a reorganisation of the medical centre.
This episode of Spring 2004 put a question mark over my own assessment of my mental state of mind. Was I truly suffering severe mental illness of the delusional kind all along? I was expecting that things will be resolved through the courts in my favour eventually but this had not happened. Instead I suffered on and on. For this reason I started testing whether the clocks were still to be relied upon for guidance on what action I should be taking and I soon found out that this method was not reliable. However, I also considered that this may have been due there being nothing further left to be done with the courts. Anyhow I gradually gave up using this method of checking in order to get some direct control over events. My younger sister had been sending me emails about dharma in her own fight to recover some of her financial inheritance from our father who passed away in December 2004. I wrote to her of my experiences and questioned: Is having faith in God that He can play an intricate part in one's personal life if only one found a way of invoking Him, the ultimate delusion? I am keeping an open mind while the psychiatrist continues to treat me with medication with Rashmi insisting that I keep up with the medication (4 mg of Risperidone each day with the occasional break). Taking ones medicines and opportunities as they come, that is, to go with the flow, is part of that faith which I am holding on to. The questions on duty, swadharma and swakarma and swabhava that you mention are from the Gita, are naturally part of that quest but the ultimate question must remain whether God can play an interactive part in the life of an individual. If the answer is yes, what are the attributes required of the 'jiva' to be able to invoke such an interaction. If the answer is no, then the psychiatrists are not only right in their diagnosis, also we humans are left with nothing better to fall back on to guide us in life than to work mechanically according to the principles of karma and hope for the best outcome for one's efforts in this life and in the afterlife. Where did this leave me with the theory of having been selected to wage a war with God's blessing to fight for my reputation in the UK, I questioned.