From rxpgnews.com

India
A boy minus hands and legs - and love for water
Jan 14, 2007 - 8:19:55 AM

Patna, Jan 14 - He has no hands and no legs. But the six-year-old still enjoys life, as long as he is allowed to be in water.

Be it summer or winter, Sachin alias Chotu, handicapped by birth, prefers to spend hours in water to get rid of what his parents say is incessant heat in his body.

Sachin lives in his parental house in Ramdohar village in Gaya district, about 125 km from the Bihar state capital.

'He is like a fish. He cannot live comfortably without water. Whatever the season, he has to spend hours in water,' says Sachin's mother Kalawati Devi.

In her early 30s, she explained that Sachin, the youngest of three children, becomes restless if he is not in contact with water.

'We put him in a big plastic bucket full of water in summer. He spends the entire day in water during summer. Even in winter months we have to put him in the bucket at least three to four times a day.' Kalawati said.

In summer, Sachin is taken out of water only when it is time to eat. His mother feeds him, but the amount of food he eats is like a normal child.

'If the water becomes hot, we change the water three to four times a day.'

In winter, when even adults keep a distance from cold water, Chotu spends hours in water. And at night, he does not even use a blanket, when the mother makes him lie next to her.

Sachin's father, Rampukar Prasad, works in a private company in West Bengal, a job he secured soon after the boy's birth.

'When he was born, he was abnormal as he was handicapped. For a month he behaved like any other child. After a month he began crying and would keep quiet only if he was fanned,' his uncle Rajkumar Prasad told IANS.

'Slowly we realised that he feels comfortable only when we keep him cool. He was always happy when we bathed him. So whenever he cried we put him in a bucket of water.'

The family cannot understand the strange phenomenon.

Kalawati Devi says she prays to god that one day the boy will become a normal child.

'We are poor people. It is beyond our means to go to Delhi, Mumbai or Madras - for treatment. If someone comes forward to help us, it will be good.'

The family has shown Sachin to local allopathic, homeopathic and ayurvedic doctors. But Sachin remains what he is - handicapped and extremely fond of water to beat the heat in his body.

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