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God said, "Let there be light," and there indeed was light. But creating things isn't quite so simple. Ask the scientists and medical experts working on replacement organs for human patients - heart, liver, bladder, brain, what have you. These are generated using what they call pluripotent stem cells. You may think Viagra is a miracle, but wait for a few years and you will see the real, yes, the real miracle. You know what I mean. At Yokohoma City University in Japan, they have created a liver. A Harvard University department has successfully fabricated artificial human tissues interlaced with blood vessels. Sweden's Karolinksa Institute has put man-made windpipes in eight patients who had lost their originals to cancer. And Wake Forest University in the US has grown and put bladders into seven children without so much as a "Please may I go to the loo". Oh, yes, creation of human organs no longer requires divine oration, just a walk to the laboratory.
And Indians, worry not. You didn't know about India's organ regeneration technology development project, did you? In a country where, thanks to Arnab Goswami, the nation is forced to know everything, this fabulous technology has been assiduously kept under wrap. You would think India's nuclear tests were secret; hah, hah, every spy agency from CIA to KGB to Burkina Faso's two-man set-up knew about the goings-on at Pokhran. But organs created using pluripotent stem cells? Not a soul knows about it. This is, we assure you, the first time ever that anything of this sort is being revealed in public. After all, 67 years after Independence, if we don't celebrate the nation's achievements, who will?
We had access to a secret facility cleverly equipped out in the subterranean craters created by the aforementioned nuclear tests in the deserts of Rajasthan. White-coated worthies walked about, minds fixated on olfactory nerves and mitral valves and osculatory organs. Before we could see much of the action taking place in well-secured glass chambers, we were scurried into the director's office, where sitting on a giant artificially generated human derriere, the potentate of pluripotency offered to take us around. "See," he declared with the importance that such a declaration warranted, "see what we are generating for Indians." We will let you in on what we saw, but you must swear on your original heart you won't spread the word around.
In the first crystal bell jar, amid tubes and bubbles, what clearly was a mouth was taking shape. A note said it had been ordered by the Congress for a certain "Mr R G", who was deemed to have seen a lot but spoken too little and, therefore, the new organ. The next held three nascent noses, all aquiline and airy. Its note said it had been ordered by Subramanian Swamy and we presume it is because he needs more noses to sniff out more controversies. Another effervescent vessel held an expanse of delicate organic fabric. "Skin," the potentate pontificated. "Ordered by the Marxists. They told us they needed it for an enemy in West Bengal whose thick skin needed replacing." The next was an expansive glass tub with a lot of feet suspended in foetal position. We read the note. It was an order from the Samajwadi Party. Clearly, the party needed a ready stock to replace the feet that its leaders kept putting in their mouths. A smaller container nearby held an almost ready tongue. "From the well-wishers of Dr Manmohan Singh," said the note on it. There were hundreds of others, but time was running short. Before we left, we saw a new heart growing in a neat jar. It looked all loving and all encompassing. But there was no note attached to the jar. We left wondering who the delicate, sensitive organ was for.
Free Run is a fortnightly look at alternate realities
joel.rai@bsmail.in
joel.rai@bsmail.in
