Not just Information Technology, but Bangalore has been making strides in other sectors as well. However, these have not been acknowledged so well for the simple reason that they are not so high profile. Quietly, but quite significantly, the city has become the hub of heart medicine and treatment, and there is one person that we can thank for putting Bangalore on the world’s medical map. Dr. Devi Prasad Shetty deserves all the praise that Bangaloreans can give.

His beginnings were humble enough. He was educated and trained in general surgery from the Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore (1982). He attained basic training in Cardiac Surgery at the West Midlands Cardiothoracic Rotation programme.

This was followed by his appointment at the Guy’s Hospital London – Cardiothoracic Unit, between 1983 and 1989. In 1989 Dr. Shetty and his team set up a 140-bed hospital Research Institute in Calcutta.

It is in Calcutta that he hit big time and began making the country sit up and take notice of his work. He also has the distinction of being Mother Teresa’s doctor and treated her every time that she fell sick, especially before she breathed her last. But he was never the one to rest on his laurels.

In 1997 he and his team set up the Manipal Heart Foundation - a 450-bed heart operation facility. A recent addition to his list of accomplishments is the Rabindranath Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences, a full-fledged cardiac hospital built on 5 acres of land in Calcutta.

But now, Bangalore can boast of his own brain child the Narayana Hrudalaya, a world renowned facility for heart treatment, which is famous in many other countries. In fact, patients from neighboring countries and even developed countries come to the facility for his expert treatment.

His list of achievements is incredible to say the least. He is the first heart surgeon in India to venture into neo-natal open-heart surgery. He performed the first open-heart surgery in the world to close a hole in the heart with the help of a microchip camera. He used an artificial heart for the first time in India and performed the first surgery in India using the blood vessels of the stomach to bypass the blocked arteries of the heart.

The list is in fact endless. He also performed Asia’s first dynamic cardiomyoplasty operation/ Dr Shetty's another claim to fame is his effort in reducing the cost of heart operations. The package pricing system devised by him has made heart surgery affordable to the common man. He is also responsible for introducing the concept of assembly line heart surgery, which aims at reducing the cost of surgery and achieving zero mortality.

But everybody will agree that his greatest achievement has been his work with children. He operates free for kids under twelve, and of his 13000 operations in a 16 year career span, over 5000 operations were on children. For him, compassion is the biggest thing in life. He has gone on record many times to say that, “If I am given a choice I would like to treat only poor patients. But unfortunately the economic reality does not allow me to do that."

Obviously, his personal mission is glaring clear – to make cardiac surgery affordable by creating a chain of heart hospitals in every state in India to serve the working class.

“There are clever people and some people are cleverer than me. I like to associate with people cleverer than me” says Shetty.

He won another feather in his already full cap when his hospital was appointed as the telemedicine center by some countries. With this Narayana Hrudayalaya is the biggest telemedicine center in the world, catering to some 19 countries, and exporting its expertise to wherever it is required. The hospital has made full use of Bangalore’s biggest asset, IT, in making heart treatment reachable and technologically viable.

But, why Bangalore? “This is where there is there is a lot of potential and expertise. I felt I had to give back something,’’ he says. Well, what can Bangaloreans say, except carry on doctor, we are behind you every inch of the way.