Sampat Ramteke Biography 
Sampat Ramteke was an engineer and social activist from Nagpur, best remembered for raising awareness about the sickle cell disease. He passed away on 17 November 2017 at the age of 67 following a cardiac arrest, and he was survived with his wife and two children. His son works in IT field and his daughter is a physiotherapist by profession. He was posthumously honoured with Padma Shri by government of India in 2018 for his contributions towards the field of social service.
Sampat Ramteke was born in Nagpur, Maharashtra in 1950. After completing his engineering studies, he worked at Western Coalfields Limited (WCL) and retired as a superintending engineer in 2010. A major turning point happened in his life when his son was diagnosed with sickle cell disease and he felt the need to create awareness about the disease among people. For the same purpose, he founded the Sickle Cell Society of India (SCSI) in 1991, and for more than 25 years till his death in 2018 he worked towards creating awareness about the disease among people.
He also took efforts to include patients with this disease in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act and succeeded in this mission in 2016, a couple of years before his death. His son Harshal who was diagnosed with sickle cell disease is currently working as computer engineer in California.
Sampat Ramteke passed away in November 2017 and a couple of months later, his name was announced among the list of Padma Shri winners for the year 2018. Though he has been nominated for this prestigious honour twice before when he was alive, he couldn’t make it to the final list as he never indulged in lobbying.
Published: March 01, 2019
Updated: March 01, 2019
