India, July 22 -- That fateful Tuesday evening in 2006, Dr Aparna Deshpande, the then associate professor and head of the emergency unit at the King Edwards Memorial (KEM) Hospital, was heading home when she was called back to the hospital along with all the other doctors. Seven coordinated blasts in trains along the western railways had left a trail of dead and wounded, and the city reeling from the tragedy.

Within an hour, the KEM hospital, closest to two of the stations where the blasts had occurred, saw its halls filled with the injured. Doctors recall the horror of dismembered bodies, the severe lung damage, the massive blood loss due to shrapnel piercing bodies, and even the severe spinal injuries leading to 18 surgeries. The trage...