About Us – Project Life Force

OUR STORY

Project Life Force (PLF) was formed in the summer of 2013 by a group of like-minded individuals, who wanted to eradicate the lack of blood prevalent in our country. Mr. Gaurav Kapoor had been working towards this cause alone for a few years when he was approached by Mr. Pranab Bedi to join hands in this mission. Nishita Jajodia and Antara Agarwal, two recent high school graduates, attended their first blood donation camp in May 2013 and decided that they needed to do something for the acute shortage of blood in West Bengal. They approached Mr. Gaurav Kapoor and Mr. Pranab Bedi with an unwavering desire to work towards this cause. Therefore, Project Life Force was born, and on June 16th 2013, we held our first blood donation camp.

10 years of serving, 285 volunteers, over 838 Blood Donation Camps, partnered with 250+ organisations and over 54,934 units collected.

PLF is a 100% voluntary-run, not-for-profit organization that runs a 24×7 blood helpline number in Kolkata since its inception. It is an endeavor to wipe-out the blood deficit in our society. Our belief is that blood is a fundamental right and no person should ever die due to non-availability of blood. Starting from West Bengal we hope to expand our reach across India. The main idea was to bridge the gap of blood shortage in the short-term, while having a youth-oriented plan to completely overcome the shortage gradually.

Projects have a start and end date and the name Project Life Force was given to this organisation because we had a dream to wipe out blood deficit by 2020. We were naïve to think this was possible, given the gravity of the situation. However, the name still holds dear to all of us.

We realised very early on that PLF would grow only by educating and including the youth. Medically we have been as thorough as possible, however, we aspire to capture the imagination of the young because the youth brings in new ideas, energy and most importantly, continuity.

PLF has since started engaging with corporates, schools, colleges, religious & social institutions and building communities among others in order to educate them about the critical situation as well as clear any myths or doubts that they may have. Post the awareness session, we facilitate a blood camp at their premises. The distribution of blood is then enabled by licensed blood banks, once the due testing is done in accordance to the Indian laws.

Project Life Force envisions a Zero Blood Deficit Society. This is only possible with the support of every Indian. The day we realize that blood donation is our social responsibility, is the day our country will begin to overcome the annual shortfall of 3 to 4 million units of blood. The youth of this country has to take the lead & take India towards being a blood surplus country. Come join us in our mission today!

BLOOD DONATION ON WHEELS

In the words of Mr. Pranab Bedi, one of our founders, “A dream is not a dream if it is not unreasonable.”

We launched our first Blood Donation Bus on 19th June, 2019. When we had no resources and a very small team, we did not have the opportunity to do something like this. However, we still had a big dream, which is to be a good, high-quality blood bank; that can be a model blood bank, not just for the city, but for the entire country. In our pursuit towards that blood bank, we started thinking about the periphery and the idea of launching a blood donation bus was born.

A bus of this size and scale is something that no private organisation or NGO had done. Others are following suit after realising that a blood donation bus is the way forward. After the success of our first bus, we launched our second bus on 6th December 2020. Since the pandemic-hit, PLF has been deploying its 2 fully equipped mobile blood donation buses in different areas to serve the society and we have been following complete COVID precaution guidelines.

If you dream big you can achieve big. Our dream remains and our work and motivation towards it increases every day!

OUR APPROACH

Project Life Force (PLF) is an endeavor to wipe-out the blood deficit in our society. Our belief is that blood is a fundamental right and no person should ever die due to non-availability of blood. Starting from Kolkata, we hope to expand our reach across West Bengal and beyond.

At PLF we have identified a model which we refer to as the ADD Model, which is:

A – Awareness & Motivational sessions are conducted with students & corporates wherein we inform people about the crisis & ways to overcome it. Special emphasis is laid on the fact that it is SAFE to donate blood & one doesn’t contract any disease by donating blood. Through these sessions we empower the youth and encourage them to become regular blood donors.

D – Donation of blood follows the Awareness Sessions. These camps are normally conducted at the premises of the school, college, office, factory, residential building or religious communities where the awareness session had taken place. We have redefined blood camps as a “Celebration of Life” event. One has to attend our camps to experience this celebration.

D – Distribution of blood is probably the biggest challenge of this ADD model. We advocate Right to Blood and are continuously brain-storming new ways to facilitate the distribution of blood in a fair & ethical manner.