Fortunes changed for 17-year-old Nepali national Moti Kala in a day after Newsline highlighted her predicament in a news report on Sunday. Kala, suffering from rheumatic heart disease, was struggling for the last six months to arrange the finances to pay for a surgery at the PGI.

Today, a team from the Rotary Heartline, a project under the Rotary Club Chandigarh, visited the girl at the PGI and got her admitted at the Fortis Hospital, Mohali, for a free heart surgery. The surgery is expected to be performed this week.

“We were moved by the child’s plight and wanted to save her life. At Fortis, the cost of surgery for replacement of the mitral valve is around Rs 1.75 lakh, which will be paid by the club. The Rotary Club, which has arranged over 265 surgeries for children from the economically weaker section since 1999, raises funds from its own members and is also helped by philanthropists,” said Kewal Seth, project director of Rotary Heartline.

Hailing from Jajarkot district of Nepal, Kala and her 20-year-old brother Sunil have been living at a gurdwara in the PGI since December.