Odisha: Last rites of 14-year-old organ donor performed with full state honours at Swargadwar

Bhubaneswar: A day after the parents of a brain dead 14-year-old girl agreed to donate her liver for transplant, the minor’s last rites were performed with full state honours at Swargadwar cremation ground at Odisha’s Puri town on Saturday.

Earlier, the state government had announced that the organ donors in Odisha would get full state honours at their funerals.

Dukhabandhu Mahanta and Banita Mahanta, the parents of Damayanti Mahanta, yesterday agreed to donate her liver for transplant after doctors at AIIMS-Bhubaneswar declared the minor girl as brain dead.

The minor girl was suffering from chronic kidney aliments and undergoing dialysis for the last few months.

She was admitted to the premier health institute on February 15 soon after she suffered a brain stroke. Subsequently, the girl went into coma and was on ventilator support. She was declared brain dead by the doctors at AIIMS-Bhubaneswar following a series of tests, sources said.

After receiving consent from her parents, doctors at the health institute collected the girl’s liver for transplant into a recipient in New Delhi. The organ was airlifted to the national capital yesterday, sources said.

The girl’s last rites were performed at Swargadwar cremation ground at Puri today. Senior officials of the district administration paid their last respect to the departed soul and the body was consigned to flames with full state honours, including 21 gun salutes at Swargadwar, sources added.