Choon, Budgam: A blood donation camp, in collaboration with Blood Bank Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, Valley’s lone tertiary care hospital, was held here at village Choon, 3km from main town Budgam on Wednesday. The camp was organised by Itehad-e-Milat committee, a volunteer group working under joint resistance leadership. Around 50 people, mostly youth of the villages of Choon, Kurhama, Bagandar, Budibagh, participated in the camp by donating blood to the Blood bank.

The organisers of the camp said that the camp was held in order to “help those who shed their blood for the movement and are battling for life in hospitals”.
The chief organiser of the camp, Bashir Ahmed Budgami, who is district president of Muslim League (M), said that the camp was held to “help the fellow Kashmiris in this hour”.

“Its main purpose is to collect blood for those who are injured. It is to give a helping hand to those who need us at this critical juncture,” he said.

Fifty pints of blood were collected in the camp and the youth of the adjoining villages were waiting in the lines for their turn. Noor ul Haq, a government teacher, who donated one  blood pint said, “There are thousands of our brothers who are lying in the hospital and who need blood. I donated it so that I may be of any help to the movement”.

Faizan Ahmed, 17, a teenager from Kurhama, who too donated blood in the camp said, “I think it is our responsibility as youth to help others who have been injured. They have no one but us”.

Itehad-e-Milat committee is a local body formed by the people during the uprising to help each other and to organise protests and collect food and money for the needy in times of uprising.

In the last four months, Itehad-e-Milat committees distributed food and medicine for the needy and poor classes of the society. It is funded by the common people and Auqaf committees.