Today we made the final withdrawal from this crowdfunding campaign.  The accounts are given below.  However, first we wanted to note our thanks to some key people:

• The doctors and staff of Synergy Hospital, Dehradun, especially Dr. Krishna Avtar, who was Trepan's neurologist throughout the struggle against this disease. Throughout this struggle they were professional and committed, and Dr. Avtar in particular was exceptional for his kindness, compassion and empathy both towards Trepan himself and towards the rest of us.
• Milaap, which kindly matched our donations with either 15% or 10% from its own end for most of our campaign and in the last two weeks or so waived its fees as well.
• Most of all, all of you, who made all this possible and gave us such enormous hope and courage. Knowing how much Trepan and his work are loved across the world was one of the key reasons, indeed perhaps the main reason, that we were able to go on.

There has been a tremendous outpouring of grief here in Uttarakhand after Trepan passed away. All the major newspapers and TV channels covered his passing and there has been a flood of articles and social media posts in his memory.  More obituaries are likely to be written in the coming days. Many of the key ones will be posted on Chetna Andolan's website, https://chetnamovement.wordpress.com.  Public meetings in Trepan's memory are being held in Chamiyala (Tehri Garhwal) on August 29th and in Dehradun on September 6th.  An online gathering is also likely to take place on September 3rd or 4th - dates will be announced on social media (you can follow @ChetnaAndolan on Twitter for updates about this and about the organisation's work in general).  

We wanted to share the overall expenses of Trepan's hospital stay, which unfortunately greatly exceeded our estimates:

Doctors' fees, tests, ICU and room charges from May 28 to Aug 13, 2020: Rs. 11,37,078

Medication expenses in hospital pharmacy from May 28 to Aug 13, 2020: Rs. 4,43, 423

Milaap platform fees, taxes and payment gateway charges (note that near the end Milaap stopped charging fees on this campaign): Rs. 1,34,086 

TOTAL EXPENSES: Rs. 17,14,587

TOTAL DONATIONS RAISED IN CROWDFUNDING, including matching donations from Milaap:  Rs. 17,62,925


As you can see, despite the enormous outpouring of generosity from around the world, the tragedy is that Trepan's family is left with only Rs. 48,000 from the crowfunding campaign (there is also approximately Rs. 45,000 in other donations that were received).  On top of all this, a large amount of money - we estimate at least Rs. 60,000 - was stolen from Trepan's account over the last two weeks due to an online fraud linked to his debit card that we only discovered on August 10th.  

 In addition, there are debts of approximately Rs. 2.4 lakhs for medications and costs prior to the hospitalisation as well.  In sum, the family is still in the red as far as medical expenses are concerned.

 Hence we will be doing another round of collection of donations to give his wife and children something to start with.  We may or may not do this over crowdfunding, but if we do, we will keep you posted.

Thank you all for being with us on this long and difficult journey. Trepan's thoughts will live on through his wife Nirmala and children Akshat and Paridhi, whose efforts during this illness were heroic; through his books and writings; through his comrades and organisations; and through the tens of thousands of people who have been reached by his work and the struggles he fought.  His body may have left us, but his spirit will be with us forever.

On the morning of August 13th, Thursday, this amazing human being who had won so many battles for justice lost his last battle - for his own life.  

He fought till the very end.  Even on Sunday, three days before his passing, he wrote "Main bilkul thik hoon" on his eye tracker as we talked about the efforts to get him out of the ICU.  Unfortunately on Monday his alertness level again dropped.  We hoped it was due to a medication side effect - his treating physician stopped that medication on Monday itself.  However on Tuesday his alertness deteriorated further and on Wednesday morning his blood pressure began wildly fluctuating, indicating that his autonomic nervous system - the part of the central nervous system that controls automatic functions such as heartbeat and blood pressure - had been severely compromised. This happens in some people affected by this type of neurodegenerative disorder. In addition other indicators also began to turn negative. This had happened earlier as well, so we continued to hope that he would again recover - as he had several times before, in a manner that surprised even the doctors with the sheer intensity of his will to live.  

But this time it was too much even for Trepan.  On Thursday morning his heartbeat slowed and stopped.  At approximately 7 am he left us.

We will miss Trepan terribly, and we will write more about his incredible life of courage, compassion and dignity.  His hospital expenses alone have crossed about 15 lakhs.  We will pay the  pending bills out of the money that all of you so generously gave us, and the remaining funds will be given to his wife, Nirmala.  We will post an accounting of the total funds here in a day or two.  We will be attempting to raise more money for his family in future in order to give them a secure base to work from.

We will also be doing a series of events and other programs in Trepan's memory.  We will share details of these events on Twitter and other social media.  

Thank you again for standing by Trepan and all of us during these last few months of his long journey.  Your generosity helped keep all of our spirits alive - including his own - in this most difficult phase of his  struggle.  It is not a debt that any of us will ever be able to repay.  We only hope that you will join us in honouring his memory by celebrating and furthering the struggles for justice to which he gave his life.

Thank you again for all the help, support and solidarity Trepan has received during this crowdfunding effort.  We still need at least 10 lakhs more, so please continue to share and circulate as much as possible.

Trepan's condition has improved after the dip last week, and he's recovered most of his energy. He remains a little less than fully alert and some indicators are still not fully stable, so the doctors are still waiting for improvement before attempting any change.   His eye tracker has not functioned too well yesterday and today, but we've been talking to him through trying to lip read or codes (one blink for yes, two for no etc.)  Hopefully his tracker will work better by tomorrow.

As a result of the ICU stay being prolonged beyond the amount we hoped, his hospital expenses have also increased well beyond what we expected, so donations remain vital.  Thank you for everything so far, and we'll keep you posted on how things go over the next few days.