Janardan Ghosh donates blood for the 100th time. Picture by Dipankar Chatterjee

Burdwan, Aug. 10: Janardan Ghosh was eight when his mother, a leukaemia patient, died because there wasn’t enough blood for her treatment. Last month, at the age of 54, he donated blood for the 100th time.

When Ashalata Ghosh died in Kalna, Burdwan, in 1962, younger son Janardan vowed he would not let anyone suffer like his mother if he could help it.

He will be felicitated by Burdwan Medical College and Hospital on August 15 for keeping his pledge. Ashalata had died in this hospital, then called Bijoy Chand Hospital.

“I promised my mother on her deathbed that I would try my best to prevent people from dying because of a shortage of blood,” Ghosh, a paddy farmer, said in his hut in Kalna, about 180km from Calcutta.

“We want to honour him for his mission. This will also inspire others,” said Subodh Bhattacharjee, head of pathology at the hospital. “In the last 34 years, he has donated blood 100 times.”

As a donor, Janardan is careful about his health. He leads a life free of addiction.

“The blood I donate should be pure and safe and for that I never smoke or drink. I eat plenty of vegetables and fish and drink a lot of water. I donate my blood thrice a year on an average and will continue to do so as long as I can,” he said.

The blood he donates helps keep 35-year-old Chandana Chakraborty of Kalna alive. Like Janardan’s mother, she too has leukaemia.

“I know his mother died of the same disease and that she did not get blood for transfusion. But his blood has saved my life and I’m grateful,” Chandana said.

Janardan’s three daughters have followed in his foot- steps. “We also donate blood when we can,” said the eldest, Shilpi.

The farmer said he had never expected to be rewarded for donating blood in his mother’s memory. He spoke of the day Ashalata died.

“It’s all so long ago, 46 years. She died in this same hospital.... It was the saddest moment of my life. I stood beside her bed, helpless, while my father frantically tried to get B+ blood for her, but in vain.”

Janardan’s blood group is B+ too.

His elder brother Sanatan is a Group D employee at Kalna hospital and sister Chandibala lives in Hooghly. Their father Kanailal had split his nine bighas of farmland between his two sons before his death in 1968.