A 24-km ‘green’ corridor – made signal-free and traffic-free – was set up by the traffic police to transport a live heart, meant for transplantation, from one corner of the city to another.

The vital organ was transported from M.S. Ramaiah Hospital in north Bengaluru to B.G.S. Global Hospital in the south of the city. The entire journey, which otherwise would have taken more than an hour, took about 20 minutes.

Motorists, who initially thought the disruption in traffic was due to the movement of politicians, soon realised it was for transporting a heart. Doctors coordinating the transportation said it took place without any hassles.

The donor, a 21-year-old brain dead patient, had met with a road accident on Thursday near Jalahalli Cross. He was declared brain dead on January 2 and the doctors at M.S. Ramiaah hospital convinced the family to donate his organs.

A matching recipient was found in BGS Global Hospital, where a 29-year-old man, suffering from cardiac ailment had registered with the Zonal Coordination Committee of Karnataka (ZCCK) seeking heart transplant.

Along with the heart, two kidneys and corneas of the brain dead patient were donated. One of the kidneys was given to a matching patient at Apollo Hospital and the other to another patient in the donor hospital (M.S. Ramaiah). The corneas have been given to Lion’s Eye Bank.

This is the third time in four months the Bengaluru City police have been called in to aid the transportation of organs. On September 3, police ensured an ambulance covered 45kms in 40 minutes; while, on December 19, more than 25 policemen were part of an operation that involved transporting a heart from Bengaluru to Chennai in a matter of four hours.