Dr. Vidya Acharya, affectionately known all over the country as the “Mother of Nephrology”, started her illustrious medical career, completing her undergraduate and postgraduate studies from the prestigious Seth G.S. Medical College and KEM Hospital. She dedicated herself completely to these institutions, where she joined as faculty and contributed immensely to the development of the Departments of Medicine and Nephrology.

She ventured into a male-dominated world and her entire journey was characterized by a fearlessness and unflagging energy that ensured establishment of a department that was the cynosure of the world’s eyes. Many of her students, trained and nurtured under her, have achieved positions of prominence. All her students stand witness to the care, love and attention showered on them. For even those who were not fortunate enough to be counted among her immediate students, she always held out a helping hand, a comforting shoulder and a compassionate embrace.

She contributed much to the development of Nephrology in the state, the western zone, and the country. She developed the first dialysis and transplant facilities in western India and she was a vigorous advocate of decease donor kidney transplant. She was also very active in prevention of kidney diseases for which she organized various educational and screening programs through National Kidney Foundation, India.

She was the founding member of Indian Society of Nephrology and Indian Society of Organ Transplant and served as the president of both societies. She was instrumental in bringing all renal health care professionals together by organizing first ever conference called “Conference of Renal Health Care Professionals (COREP)” in 2012. This conference was highly applauded by the International Federation of Kidney Foundation (IFKF)

She was a great academician and had more than 250 publications in various national and international journals. She was an invited speaker and a visiting professor to universities and medical schools both at home and abroad. She was instrumental in bringing Indian Nephrology on the world map.

Even after her retirement, she continued to remain a great teacher and a researcher and devoted herself wholeheartedly in training students of Nephrology and encouraging them to conduct research.

For all her contributions in the field of nephrology, she received numerous awards including Lifetime achievement award from Indian Society of Nephrology and South Asia region pioneer award from International Society of Nephrology.

The nephrology Community and in particular, the members of the West Zone Chapter of the Indian Society of Nephrology are indebted to her and have instituted this Oration in her honour.

Previous Recipients of the Award

Dr. Sudhir Shah (2006)
Dr. Sharda Sabnis (2007)
Dr Mohan Rajapurkar (2008)
Dr. Ramesh Khanna (2009)
Dr. Alan Almeida (2010)
Dr. Kumud Mehta (2011)
Dr. M.K. Mani (2012)
Dr. Sanjay Agarwal (2013)
Dr. Arun Halankar (2014)
Dr. Prakash Keshaviah (2015)
Dr. R. Ravichandran (2016)
Dr. Vivekand Jha (2017)
Dr. V. N. Sakhuja (2018)
Dr. Marcelo Cantarovich (2019)
Dr. Jeremy Chapman (2020)
Dr. Ashok Kirpalani (2021)
Dr. Muthusetupaty (2022)
Dr. Georgi Abraham (2023)