Jan 14, 2011, 01.16am IST
KOLKATA: A patient with a rare blood group left doctors stumped at a city hospital this week. Haradhan Pal, a 68-year-old cancer patient, has O+ blood group but he could not be given blood from normal donors of the same group.

Why? Tests revealed that Pal belonged to the rare "Bombay blood group" that didn't match with any of the other groups. First identified in Mumbai, from which the group derives its name, so far there have been just 179 such cases reported in India.