On April 18, 2016 MOHAN Foundation was invited to give a talk on organ donation to the students of XIth class of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan’s Mehta Vidyalaya, KG Marg, New Delhi. The session was organized by the Times of India team, the third in the school series as part of organ donation drive that would culminate in the month of August on organ donation day.
Founded in 1938 by Dr. K. M. Munshi, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan is today an all Intellectual, Cultural & Educational Movement dedicated to the twin tasks of interpreting the age old yet ageless message of our country of integration of our varied and vibrant culture with the changing needs of the present day world.
The school organizes a social awareness and sensitivity camp annually at the commencement of the new academic session for class XI. The camp aims to enhance the personality, self-esteem, team building & decision-making ability, community awareness and other life skills of students. The talk on organ donation was the inaugural session of the 10-day camp. Dr. Jyoti Dev Rishi (School Counselor) coordinated the whole program.
The event began with the lamp lighting ceremony. Dr. Anju Tandon (Principal, BVB Vidyalaya) and Ms. Vibha Kohli (Vice Principal, BVB Vidyalaya) invited Dr. Muneet to light the lamp. This was followed by school prayer and addresses by the principal and vice principal respectively.
Dr. Muneet began the session by introducing the Foundation’s work and activities. She then explained the basic concepts of organ donation and transplantation in an easily comprehensible manner to the students. The session was very well received and understood by the students as evident by the barrage of questions that the students asked at the end of the session. To name a few, who can give consent for organ donation for people who have no blood relatives or for orphans, should there be a law that approves to retrieve organs from prisoners serving life sentence in jail, India should have a presumed consent like European countries to improve the donation rate and in brain death, organs also undergo a process of degeneration so how can the organs be retrieved.
About 200-220 students attended the session.