Some people are driven by change and some have it in them to bring about change. Karthik Naralasetty – founder of Socialblood(www.socialblood.org) – is a 24-year-old agent of change from Guntur, Andhra Pradesh (India), with a knack for social and community development.
The technology-savvy Naralasetty, who attended Rutgers University in the US, came up with a simple plan to develop a web-page which would connect blood donors and recipients scattered across the globe.
While tackling a social issue that remains desperately unattended in this part of the world, Naralasetty maintains a no-holds-barred attitude towards the donors and recipients – an element missing from many several social reformers.
The myths shadowing ‘blood donation’ In developing countries such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh donating blood is still a subject of discussion rather than being a natural act of social service. Malnutrition, abject poverty, lack of awareness and similar factors contribute towards a society for which the idea of donating blood is unfathomable. Various organisations responsible for conducting blood collection drives often encounter people who are required to be convinced in order to donate blood.
According to various surveys and researches, a large section of the population have never donated blood because they were either not aware of the problem or were not asked for it, which calls for massive awareness about cases where blood supply becomes crucial for survival.
The beginning of a ‘blood movement’ It all started with a Facebook update that caught Naralasetty’s eye.
“I saw a post on Facebook where a son was looking for B+ blood group type for his father and minutes later I read another post where he was thanking all the people who connected him to the donor. It was enough to open my mind to the extreme possibilities and I decided to utilise Facebook’s ‘power’ to reach out to people in need.”
While Naralasetty’s mind was set on the idea of a social movement, the real motivation behind the Socialblood model came from a four-year-old thalassemic girl who needed blood transfusion after every 25 days. She was based in a rural part of India and did not have the resources to replenish the blood supplies available in the local blood banks as is the general modus operandi in developing countries.
Development of strategic alliance Four months down the road, Naralasetty received a telephone call from Pavan, an engineering student from National Institute of Technology, Karnataka. Pavan – a software developer – was so inspired by the idea that he proposed to volunteer and work pro bono for Socialblood.
“Pavan’s work is quite commendable. I came up with the idea but he worked on the strategies and took responsibility to launch our global web-page, which constitutes 17 countries including Pakistan” Naralasetty told Dawn.com.
Moment of inspiration Since the inception of Socialblood, the webpage has helped various donors and recipients to connect and interact regularly. The success of a plan can be assessed by the feedback it receives from the participants and Socialblood seems to transcend humanity.
“A nine-year-old boy from the northern side of Bangalore needed blood for a complicated heart surgery. Living in Bangalore, I decided to volunteer. When I reached the hospital, I found four other people who showed up after finding out about the recipient from Socialblood. It brought tears to my eyes and made me realise the number of lives we actually touch with our work.”
Plans for the future Socialblood’s model includes an extensive database of prospective donors and recipients and is well connected. However, Naralasetty is concerned is concerned about the operations not being location-based.
“Someone from Mumbai would not travel all the way to Calcutta in order to donate blood so we need to work on establishing a local network of donors and recipients. Moreover, we have expanded into other territories such as Brazil, Bangladesh and Nigeria and would want the local people to take ownership of the initiative and work in liaison with us,” he added.
The software developers at Socialblood are designing a mapping model, which is based along the lines of geographical mapping system, and will highlight the areas where blood is required with respect to their respective urgencies.
Socialblood in Pakistan “As a young Indian, I really do not feel any different whilst serving Pakistanis because there is a connection between the citizens of both countries. In fact I must add that helping Pakistanis make me feel that I am serving one of my own people.”
Thus far Socialblood has received minimum response from the people of Pakistan however Naralasetty and his team are optimistic that Pakistan will welcome their initiative and turn it into a huge success.
The writer is a reporter at Dawn.com.
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