Mumbai: The blood donation camp organised by HDFC Bank on December 6, 2013 involving 61,902 participants has found a place in Guinness Book of Records as the largest such drive on a single day.
"The largest blood donation (multiple venues) involved 61,902 participants and was achieved by HDFC Bank, with 1,115 blood donation camps held across 709 locations in the country on December 6, 2013," the official citation from the Guinness Records said, adding this is the only such recognition by it for any corporate in this regard.
This is the second recognition for the country comes to blood donation camps as the Shiv Sena had earlier got a mention Guinness Book of Records in 2010. When contacted, a bank official said: "At HDFC Bank, we believe that to make a meaningful contribution to the society we cannot offer short-term relief but must strive to find viable long-term solutions. This philosophy of long-term sustainable solutions drives all our CSR initiatives." He said the country needs close to 12 million units of blood each year but is able to collect just half of that. "We saw the need for a long-term sustainable programme to provide access to safe blood to the millions and it took the form of a national blood donation drive on a single day across the nation."
In fact, the bank began this way back in 2007, when it could collect only a little over 4,000 units of blood, and since then the bank decided to create awareness, and encourage donation by covering more and more cities through an annual blood donation campaigns. The drive also included setting up blood banks in areas that lacked adequate infrastructure for proper storage, the bank official said.
