In Bandipora, a district where access to healthcare can determine the difference between despair and survival, one physician redefined what it means to serve. Dr. Parvaiz Sajad Shah is not just a doctor; he is an institution of compassion, credibility, and people-first medicine.
A native of Bandipora, Dr. Shah grew up witnessing the harsh realities of healthcare in peripheral districts delayed diagnoses, financial distress, long journeys for treatment, and the silent suffering of families. These early lessons shaped his medical philosophy and anchored his resolve: to heal the place that shaped him.
After earning his MBBS and later completing his MD in Internal Medicine from SKIMS, Soura, one of the region’s most reputed medical institutions, Dr. Shah had the privilege of choice. He could have pursued an enviable career in metropolitan hospitals or elite medical centres. Instead, he chose a path less travelled: returning home to serve where the crisis was louder than the opportunity.
At District Hospital Bandipora, he became the most dependable face of clinical care. His rounds were not timed by clocks, nor were emergencies filtered by convenience. Patients recall how his calm voice carried confidence, how his presence carried hope, and how his treatment carried dignity. For thousands, he was the assurance they never had before, that care, empathy, and competence could exist in one place.
One of his most defining contributions was strengthening critical care infrastructure and ensuring the seamless functioning of the dialysis unit, a development that changed the district’s healthcare narrative. Before this, kidney patients travelled weekly to Srinagar, drained physically and economically. With dialysis now functional in Bandipora, treatment shifted from being a burden of distance to a facility of relief.Click Here To Follow Our WhatsApp ChannelIt saved lives, restored routines, and allowed families to breathe again.
Beyond clinical medicine, Dr. Shah championed public health causes often ignored in smaller districts. He played a vital role in drug de-addiction services, treating substance abuse as a medical condition, not a social stigma. He strengthened counselling frameworks, worked closely with community outreach teams, and pushed for long-term rehabilitation models. He believed medicine must treat pain, but empathy must treat people.
What sets him apart is not the number of patients he treated, but how he treated them. Wealth never influenced priority, and status never influenced care. He is known for patient listening, ethical discipline, clinical sharpness, and a rare humility that keeps the door open for everyone — literally and metaphorically.
His bond with the community became so strong that his transfers sparked public sentiment rarely seen for officials or doctors. People demanded his return not with slogans, but with emotion — because his absence felt like a vacuum, and his presence felt like security.
Dr. Shah’s journey also carries a message for governance: development is most effective when professionals choose impact over comfort. His service inspired young medical aspirants in Bandipora, many of whom now cite him as the reason they chose medicine. His legacy is not only measured in survival, but in inspiration.
Bandipora does not remember him for prescriptions, but for presence. Not for duty, but for devotion. Not for service, but for sincerity.
Suhail Rather
Journalist
Bandipora