RAJ KUMAR
Ranchi, Jan.1: It was a New Year celebration with a difference for the 54-yr-old Punjab man, Randeep Batta, who made a record on the first day of 2022 in Jharkhand capital donating his blood for the 144th time starting from the age of 18.
Batta, a resident of Panchkula, has reached Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), 1600km away from his house to match his action for the mission of donating blood at the capital of each state of the country.
Donating the blood the man remembered his mother with tears in his eyes and shared with a section of media persons how he had paid last rites to his mother on 13th day after her death by donating blood reaching Ahmedabad, the capital of Gujarat, from Panchkula.
Batta said he started donating blood from the age of 18 when he was participating in an NCC camp as a cadet in Shimla and a blood donation camp was organised there. He said he got motivated for blood donation when witnessed army jawans donating their blood.
Asked when he planned to donate blood in the capital of each state of India, he said on the occasion of the silver jubilee of his marriage. He added he completed his century in blood donation at Chandigarh and so far donated his blood in Srinagar, Shimla, Jaipur Bhopal, Patna, Lucknow, Mumbai, Agartala, Dehradun, Bhubaneswar and Kolkata besides Chandigarh and Ranchi.
The Haryana government has already honoured Batta with a gold medal for his commitment to blood donation. Apart from this, he has also been honoured more than 50 times for his commitment.
As Batta donated his blood at RIMS, director of the institute, Dr Kameshwar Prasad, honoured him by giving a certificate of blood donation.
On October 1, 2018, Mumbai’s athlete Prakash M. Nadar, 43, who was afflicted by polio, did his 110th blood donation at RIMS and had created history. His commitment was to race his blood across the country.
