talent-kerala.net

It was when they were students at A.K. Engineering College, Tamil Nadu that his friends lost Vivek.  Son of Nirmala, who had earlier lost her husband due to heart disease, Vivek too finally succumbed to the same disease.  In the midst of these tragedies, what made the mother cling on to life was her other son Vipin.

But when the doctors later diagnosed that Vipin too was suffering from the same disease, her grief and helplessness knew no bounds.  She was told by Dr.Jose Chacko, who had earlier conducted the first heart transplant in Kerala, that their only hope lay in a heart transplant.  The poor mother who had lost all except her house in the treatment of her son and husband, could find no way to meet the anticipated expenses.  It was then that hope entered her life in the form of Vivek’s former friends.

These friends, who used to keep contact with Nirmala even after the death of Vivek, came to know of Vipin’s condition and the family’s financial position.  By now employed in Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram, they thought desperately how to find Rs.10 lakhs to meet the cost of heart transplant that was urgently required.  Their yearning materialized in the form of a website savevipin.com which they soon launched.

Simple and almost crude, yet gripping with sincerity and transparency, the site became a call in the cyber wilderness for a positive action.  Help soon started pouring in.  And with that the financial hurdle to transplant was over.  As Vipin lay precariously between life and death in Kottayam, another event occurred in Kochi.  A victim of bike accident was brain dead and the deceased’s father was willing to donate the heart from the body.

The operation was a success and Vipin got a new lease of life.  The efforts of his dead brother’s college mates had finally paid off.

Vipin with his mother

Courtesy: V.R.Jyothish, Vanitha, March 1-14, 2005

Contributed by: Administrator 

"The full belly does not believe in hunger."