Roli was hit by a blind bullet

After the shooting death of a six-year-old girl in India last year, her parents made the rare decision to donate her organs.

Although India is likely to overtake China as the world's most populous country this year, India still ranks 62nd among organ donor countries.

Roli Prajapati was sleeping peacefully in the house she shared with her five brothers and sisters on the outskirts of Delhi last April. Her parents were preparing dinner in the next room when they heard a loud bang and a scream.

As they entered the room, Roli called out to her parents before fainting.

Then they saw blood coming out of his right ear and realized that something terrible had happened. She had been hit by a blind bullet.

After several days of agony, his parents took a decision that few people in India had taken before, the decision to donate his organs. Roli became the youngest organ donor at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi.

Her father Harnarayan Prajapati explained that the decision to donate a child's organs is not an easy one.

"I didn't know what to do," he said. I was thinking all night. I told the doctor that we need more time to think.

"Eventually we decided to go ahead, thinking that if my daughter's organs could save someone's life, then we should do it."

"We believe that our daughter is alive among young organ recipients, our daughter will be alive as well."

Both Roli's kidneys were transplanted into 14-year-old Dev Upadhyay, whose parents told the BBC it was 'a miracle for us' that we got the organs.

He had been waiting for a transplant for four years and said his 'life has changed' as Roli's kidneys had given Dev a 'new lease of life'.

Rowley's liver was donated to a six-year-old, her heart valves to children aged one and four, and her corneas helped restore the sight of two adults aged 35 and 71.

Rowley's death is similar to Nicholas Greene's story.

A seven-year-old boy, vacationing with his family in Italy in September 1994, was mistakenly shot at by the car he was traveling in as a suspect.

In 1993, the year before Nicolas was shot, Italy had 6.2 organ donors per million, and by 2006 the number had risen to 20 per million.

This was partly due to the country's move to an opt-out system in 1999, which makes all adults potential donors. But getting the idea of saving a life by donating to the common people was probably the most important factor.

The impact of Nicholas is clear, it is hoped that a similar change will take place in India.

At the forefront of this is Dr. Deepak Gupta, who has traveled to Rome to meet with Reg and other experts in the organ donation community.

It was Dr. Gupta who first approached Roli's parents about the option of organ donation.

He gave the example of Nicholas to Roli's father Prajapati, who is illiterate, and explained the possible effects of organ donation.

According to the Lancet Neurology Commission, one person dies from a head injury every three minutes in India and so, as Dr. Gupta says, 'there is a lot of potential for people looking for donations.'

India, which has a population of over 1.4 billion, has donated an average of 700 to 800 organs every year since 2000.

Dr Gupta has conducted a survey which shows that factors such as religion and attitudes of elderly family members can discourage donation.

But since Rowley's death last April, Delhi's AIIMS hospital has donated more organs overall in the last five years.

According to data from the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organization, 846 donations were made in India in 2022, which is more than ever before. Dr Gupta describes this as a 'turning point'.

Reg, now 94, traveled from Los Angeles to Italy to meet the people who had donated Nicholas' organs. In this journey, he met two women whose lives were changed by organ donation.

Shana Parisella's brother David was killed in a car accident in March 2013 and his heart was transplanted into Anna Iaquinta.

Nine years after the operation, Anna decided to find her donor's family and developed a strong bond with Shana, who she says is like a sister to her.

Shana, who traveled 140 km from Fondi to Rome. He said it was a dream to meet such a 'great man' who was 'an example to all'.

"It's not easy for someone who's given a heart because you think a lot and you feel bad because there's a lot of pain on the other side," Anna said. But there's so much happiness towards you, it's two different emotions at once.'

'The greatest gift of his life was meeting me and for me to just be okay and be with him, that's my thanks, but thanks is never enough.'

"Nothing will be enough to gain life."

Dev who was given Roli's kidney

Donor Data:

Spain has played a leading role in organ donation for many years due to the presence of full-time doctors trained as transplant coordinators in Spain's major hospitals.

"Transplantation is not possible if people are not involved," says Jose Luis Escalante, director of transplantation at the Gregorio Maran University Hospital in Madrid.

In 2021, for the first time in two decades, the United States overtook Spain to become the world leader in organ donations, in part due to the opioid epidemic that has killed more than 100,000 people.

Italy is ranked ninth in the world while Great Britain is ranked 13th. In May 2020, England adopted an opt-out system whereby all adults become organ donors.

Almost 300 people have donated organs in the two months since Scotland adopted the automatic donation system. Wales introduced the system in 2015.

Meanwhile, after visiting Rome, Reg traveled to Messina where he met 24-year-old Nicholas, the son of Maria Pia Pedala. She was in a coma when she received Nicholas' liver 29 years ago.

Reg says he will only stop talking about the matter when he dies. "I'm 94 years old, so I was quite old when I started," he told the BBC.

'I think I should rest my neck now but just by talking you can save someone's life, the thought motivates me every day.'