On September 20, 2020, MOHAN Foundation was invited to conduct an online awareness session on organ donation for a group of friends working at Specialist Engineering Services Pvt. Ltd in Gurugram. This group had volunteered to attend the session on a Sunday. The session was organized by Mr. Pradeep Paul, Deputy Manager, Civil BHEL (Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited), PEM. Ms. Preeti Goswami was the contact person from the Foundation’s side and Dr. Muneet Kaur Sahi, Programme Manager, MOHAN Foundation (Delhi-NCR), was the resource person.

Mr. Paul actively volunteers with various NGOs on different causes because he wants to make a positive contribution in the growth and development of the society. He is quite passionate about the cause of organ donation. In the past, he had organized two sessions on organ donation in association with MOHAN Foundation at BHEL, first one on June 5, 2018 and the second one, an online session on June 29, 2020. With the help of his friend Mr. Naresh Sharma, Manager-Engineering (DTP), Specialist Engineering Services Pvt. Ltd. (SES), he got the session organized for a group of friends from SES who volunteered to attend the session. Specialist Services Group is a global supplier of oilfield equipment, modular buildings and packaging solutions for people and equipment in the oil and gas, utility, petrochemical, power, renewables and defence industries. 

At the beginning of the session, Mr. Paul welcomed all the participants and invited Dr. Muneet to begin the session. Dr. Muneet explained to the participants that MOHAN is not someone’s name but an acronym for Multi Organ Harvesting Aid Network. She shared with them the important work that the Foundation has been doing for the last 23 years to promote the cause of organ donation and create awareness on this very important but underplayed area amongst the general public.

She stressed on the need to donate organs and explained why there was an urgent need of donating organs in India. She informed the participants that at least 10 patients die every day while on the waiting list for organs and every 10 minutes, a new name is added to the waiting list.

She explained the basic concepts of organ donation and transplantation with the help of a simple PowerPoint presentation. The following topics were explained in detail:

• Organ donation and its need in the society
• When and how does organ donation take place
• Organs that can be donated during life and after death
• Transplant waiting list in India
• Brain death
• Difference between brain death and coma
• Contraindications to organ donation
• Transplant Law

Dr. Muneet explained the importance of eye donation and the whole process of eye donation. She also explained how one can sign up to become an organ donor. 

Mr. Naresh Sharma thanked Dr. Muneet and said that the session was very informative and encouraged his friends to pledge for organ donation.

Close to 15 participants attended the session.