Usha Vakil was given the lifetime achievement award for her work with Saheli. Other finalists this year were Sonia Sujanani, Eshani Shah,Pallavi Singh, Sunila-Thomas George, Anubha Sacheti, Niranjana Parikh, Dr. Kavita Navani, Dr. Monica Bharei, Amritha Mangalat, Masooma Bhaiwala, Anjali Arora, Deepika Ravichandran,Dr. Sunita Pereira, Dr. Madhusmita Misra,Keertana Krishnan, Sapna Krishnan, Namita Dodwadkar, Ruchika Arora and Nandini Bajpai
The event this year featured a keynote address by Dr. Anant Agarwal, President of EdX. He spoke about the impact EdX had on women in rural areas who were able to expand their knowledge using online learning.
Dr. Mandy Pant and Aditi Taylor, the MCEEs for the evening kept the program flowing.
Sushil Tuli, President of Leader Bank and a sponsor, applauded the women for their accomplishments. Gita Iyer, Woman of the Year 2014, spoke about her journey. Dr. Manju Sheth announced the receipt of the Harvard Pilgrim award for 30,000 for INE Multimedia, that runs the annual health fair.
Dance by Shachi Risbud and her team performed a beautiful dance and Deepti Navaratna and her group presented music. The judges were Dr. Rama Ramakrishna, Vijay Bhatt, Indira Patel. Dr. Janine Saldanha, Geeta Aiyer, George Ruckert and Anupendra Sharma. "The winner was chosen in recognition of her immense courage to put her own life in danger to serve those suffering. That was a great inspiration". She worked in Sierra Leone to fight the Ebola epidemic, putting her own life on the line.
As usual the event ended with much dancing on the floor. DJ Yogz brought the party music on. Shobha Shastry and Alankar Decors had the place beautifully done.
Over all a lovely event.
About Dr. Nahid Bhadelia
Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, MD, MA is an infectious diseases physician, Assistant Professor at the Boston University School of Medicine and the Director of Infection Control and Medical Response at National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratory (NEIDL) at Boston University (BU). Her specialization is in infection control issues related to emerging pathogens and highly communicable infectious diseases. She is the director of the medical response program for BU’s biosafety level 4 laboratories at the NEIDL, one of 6 such programs in the US.
Aside from her clinical training in infectious diseases, she has a master’s degree in international affairs from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a background in health and human security with a focus on the impact of pandemics on macro level health indicators and community security. She has previously worked on projects with United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. She has served as a front line physician providing care to Ebola patients in Sierra Leone with World Health Organization. She is a Senior Policy and Technical Advisor to Partners in Health for their Ebola response program in Sierra Leone. She has also been an instructor for the US CDC/FEMA and Taiwan CDC’s healthcare worker preparedness courses for the Ebola Response.
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