Baby P.S. doesn’t know the name of the woman, has never met her. She just knows the voice that had called her on the phone many times over the years whenever someone was in need of blood. Baby used to do for her what she has been doing to so many for the past two decades — she arranged blood. But somehow she made sure Baby got the long due honour she deserved. She won the Vanitharatnam award for humanitarian services instituted by the Meditrina Group of Hospitals. That unknown woman had made it happen. Around the same time, Baby also won the Sthreesakthi Award from the Nizhalattam theatre group and then again the All Kerala Blood Donors Society recognised her work for promoting blood donation.
“It started as a CSR activity for the company I work with – Terumo Penpol Ltd. I had joined back in 1984 as a front office executive very reluctantly. Because I had loved my job before that. But then I began to enjoy it,” Baby recollects. She went from front office to training officer to PRO. “It is in 1999 that the founder of the company, Balagopal, brought out a plan of action for blood donation. Even back then, his brother Padmakumar — the present chairman — spoke about using flash mobs and music bands as a way to spread the message.”
Baby has always been the one to send out notices of the blood donation activities. Soon she became the go-to person for anyone who came asking for blood for someone. “It is the hospitals that should provide the blood and the bystanders should not be made to do all the running around. This is why we need a community blood bank, where we pool all the blood, and hospitals can directly exchange. For instance, if one needs RBC, it is best to contact RCC (Regional Cancer Centre) for they will have extra amounts of it. On the other hand, the RCC needs more platelets, which the Sree Chitra Hospital will have spares of.” Baby uses this formula of contacting the respective hospital according to the requirement, and also a donors list that by now she has with hundreds of members. Sometimes donors learn of their illnesses because basic checkups are done.
One day, Baby herself was admitted for her SLE and urgently needed blood. “I had about one per cent charge left in my phone and it had to be used to get someone who I knew for sure could come in such short notice. But then my phone rang and I picked it and it was a man called Anand who wanted to donate blood. It turned out his group was mine, and he came immediately. I have helped lots of people when they needed blood. And when I needed it, here’s someone who calls me at the exact same time. It’s at times like these that you call God’s name.”
