Medical aspirants, come armoured in bodysuit and helmet. Two first-year medical students of RIMS, Ranchi, were injured on Friday when their classroom's old ceiling fan fell on them, drawing attention to at least 50 other fans in the premier medical college that need to be replaced.

Around 9.30am, RIMS students and hostellers Md Shahrukh Ansari of Dhanbad and Prashant Pandey of Rohtas in Bihar, were at the physiology lecture theatre taking down notes on hormones from biochemistry professor Dr Tarique Aziz, when the moving fan landed on Prashant's back and its blade hit Shahrukh's head.

As all other students screamed and the fan was removed, Shahrukh saw his head was bleeding and Prashant couldn't move as he had suffered a slipped disc.

Shahrukh later showed his cuts. "I got eight stitches," he said. "The fan fell on the back of my friend Prashant who was sitting before me. I sustained injuries when the blade hit my temple," he said.

He added that RIMS director Dr B.L. Sherwal was very helpful. "He rushed me to the emergency where I got four stitches on my right ear and another four on my head. I heard him telling officials to immediately change the old fans," he said.

Prashant, whose lower disc of the vertebra prolapsed, said he would have sustained serious head injuries had he not leant to take class notes. "I was leaning in front, my head down, writing, when the heavy fan fell on my back. I felt a shooting pain in my vertebra," he said, adding he had been advised bed rest for 10 days.

Explaining why the mishap occurred, a RIMS official said unlike modern-day fans assembled with nuts and bolts, in the olden days, fans were attached with threads. "Due to weathering, threads got damaged," he said. "Fifty more fans in classrooms of the institute should immediately be changed," he stressed.

Contacted, both RIMS director Dr B.L. Sherwal and RIMS superintendent Dr S.K. Choudhary parried questions.