The Vallabhbhai Patel Chest Institute founded in 1949, it was started as a postgraduate medical Institute with the main aims of postgraduate medical education, research and patient care activities. The Institute, fully funded by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Government of India and maintained by the University of Delhi, has discharged its activities with national and international recognition. A brief note on the important activities during the year 2009-10 is given below.

We are very happy and honoured that Prof. P.N. Tandon, President, National Brain Research Centre Society and Emeritus Professor, Neurosurgery, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, has been appointed as the new Chairman of the Governing Body of the Institute by the University of Delhi. We would like to record our gratitude and appreciation to Prof. N.K. Ganguly, previous Chairman, Governing Body for his guidance and support for the last three years. An important milestone during this year is the approval to start DM course in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine with an intake of two students every year by the University of Delhi.

Two prestigious orations to perpetuate the memory of our two former Directors were organized this year. On the occasion of the 60th Foundation Day Celebrations, Prof. Peter J. Barnes, Head of the Department of Respiratory Medicine, Imperial College, London, Professor of Thoracic Medicine and Head of Airway Disease at the National Heart and Lung Institute and Honorary Consultant Physician at Royal Brompton Hospital, London, delivered the "11th Prof. Raman Viswanathan-VPCI Oration" on 7th April 2009. A "National Seminar on Environmental Lung Diseases" was also organized on 6th April 2009. Prof. Arun Dharmarajan, Winthrop Professor, School of Anatomy and Human Biology, Faculty of Life and Physical Sciences, the University of Western Australia, Nedlands, Perth, Western Australia, delivered the "5th Prof. Autar Singh Paintal Memorial Oration" on 24th September 2009. The Institute also organized two important meetings on Tobacco Cessation; i. National Review Meeting of Tobacco Cessation Centres on 28th-29th October 2009 and ii. National Consultation Meeting to Develop Guidelines for Tobacco Cessation on 29th-30th October 2009.

In order to commemorate the 25 years of the Bhopal Gas Disaster, the World's worst chemical industrial disaster which occurred on midnight of 2/3 December 1984, the Institute in collaboration with the Indian Council of Medical Research organized a Symposium on "Research on Bhopal Gas Tragedy" on 3rd December 2009. The 35th Workshop on "Respiratory Allergy: Diagnosis and Management" was also organized by VPCI in collaboration with the Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology from 8th-12th March 2010. During the year under review, the Institute has played a vital role in conducting investigations for the pandemic influenza H1N1 virus as per the directive of the Government of India.

The Faculty members are engaged in various research projects sponsored by different agencies of Government of India, W.H.O., etc. The vibrancy of these research projects / activities can be well judged from the list of publications in peer reviewed journals, guest lectures delivered and original papers presented in the national and international conferences by the faculty members and students of the Institute. The hospital wing (Viswanathan Chest Hospital) of the Institute continued to provide excellent diagnostic and treatment services including Critical Care management to patients suffering from respiratory and allied diseases.