Administration is not always as cold as it is made out to be. Sometimes it is a human heart that beats inside the corridors of power – like the Andhra Pradesh government secretariat in Hyderabad.

Moved by the plight of an agricultural labour couple, whose 8 month old daughter was in deperatee need of a costly liver transplant operation, the Andhra Pradesh government sent one of its officials along with the poor couple to a Chennai corporate hospital with a commitment that it would meet the Rs 30 it costs to carry out the liver transplant operation.

On Monday, doctors at the Global Hospital in Chennai were confident of saving the life of 8-month old Gnana Sai, daughter of agricultural laborers from Andhra Pradesh –Ramanappa and Saraswati from RS Kothapalli village of Chittoor district. They had already spent Rs 5 lakh on the treatment of their child, suffering from congenital liver disease and left with no money for costly transplant operation, had asked a local court in AP to allow them to kill the child through passive euthanasia.

On Monday, an Andhra Pradesh government official accompanied the couple and the child to the Global Hospital in Chennai, where its doctors carried out preliminary tests and confirmed that the girl could be saved.

The Chennai hospital will be examining the two donors, the child’s parents tomorrow. If everything goes well, the child will be operated the day after. Dr Mohamed Rela, one of the most renowned Liver transplant surgeons in the world, who has carried out 3000 such operations so far, will be operating upon the child.

“The parents of the girl child approached our hospital and we were moved by their plight. We are ready at the Global Hospitals to carry out the liver transplant operation without putting financial burden on the family in any way,” Dr K Ravindranath, chairman of the Global Hospitals Group said adding that Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu has agreed to support the hospital for the operation.

Dr Mohamed Rela, who has promised to the parent that the operation would be a straight forward one and that Gnana Sai will become better, has already examined the child. “Her liver is failing and she is getting jaundice and she clearly needs liver transplantation. She will have over 95 per cent chances of surviving a liver transplant operation and leading a normal life like any other normal kid,” Dr Rela said.

The father of the girl was in tears after the doctors assured him that his daughter would become all right. He is thankful to the local media in Andhra Pradesh and to the chief minister Naidu and host of other government officials to have made this possible.

The Andhra Pradesh government secretariat sent a private secretary to the health secretary along with the couple to thee Chennai hospital, with a commitment that the government would bear the costs of the operation.

The hospital too, responded to the situation with swiftness and readily admitted its youngest patient.