New Delhi:
You meet these men and women mostly in grim settings. Hospitals have always been about harsh lights, sombre green walls, and a doctor in a white coat holding a stethoscope. Or even a scalpel.
To walk into a popular city restaurant then, and have some of these professionals, all leading lights in their area of expertise, bust that cliche as they sang popular Bollywood songs on stage - and very well to boot - was a singular pleasure. It was good, for once, not to think hospital when you saw a doctor.
They were there, however, to highlight some sobering numbers. Every year, close to six lakh people die in India due to organ failure.
On the other side, with 70% of India's 1.4 lakh accident victims diagnosed as brain dead every year, the country has at least 80,000 potential organ donors. Yet, organs from only about 120 of them are retrieved, making the percentage of cadaver donations a dismal 0.08 per million of the population, says the MOHAN Foundation, the NGO that organised the fund-raiser.
So pediatricians, gynaecs, radiologists, transplant specialists, heads of the city's biggest hospitals gathered to raise awareness about organ donation. Also on the menu was the screening of a portion from "The Ship of Theses," an award-winning film by Anand Gandhi that focuses on the importance of organ donation.
The film will be screened at the Cannes film festival in May this year. The filmmaker was there, to take the mike when the singing doctors rested their vocal chords.
Never for long though. The enthusiastic doctors sang into the night. Crowded at a table too, post-dinner, long after the orchestra had wound up.
Among those made aware of the potential to save many more lives with a timely pledge to donate organs, was Delhi Chief Minister Shiela Dikshit, who added her name to a large pledge board filled with many signatures.
Major city hospitals were there to support the cause. Among leading doctors present were Dr DS Rana, Director, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, Dr Samiran Nundy, Chairman, Surgical Gastro and Liver Transplant, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, Prof. Anupam Sibal, Group Medical Director, Apollo Hospitals Group, Dr. A.S.Soin Chief Liver Transplant & Hepatobiliary Surgeon, Chairman, Institute of Liver Transplantation and Regenerative Medicine, Medanta - The Medicity, Dr.Sanjeev Kanoria from Advina Healthcare, UK and Dr Vijay Kher, Senior Nephrologist, Medanta - The Medicity.