New Delhi (PTI): Seeking to popularise the concept of organ donation, actress Priyanka Chopra and former cricketer Navjot Singh Sidhu on Friday pledged at a special function here to donate their organs.

"I feel particularly proud to be part of this effort as at one point of time my own father was in the need for such a transplant but thankfully things turned out to be for the better," Chopra said.

For cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu, donating one's organs was a sure-shot way to achieving immortality.

"Long after you are dead, you continue to live through the people who have got a new life from your organs," he told reporters here.

"We want more and more celebrities to come forward and take part in organ donation campaigns as it helps spread the message," Col A K Seth, Director, Army Organ Retrieval and Transplant Organisation (AORTA), said.

The function also witnessed felicitation of persons who had agreed to donate the organs of their loved ones.

The donors came from different backgrounds and their kin recounted their considerations before their decision to donate organs of their family members.

Defence Minister A K Antony, who inaugurated the function, said "with fast-changing lifestyles, the type of diseases in the country is also changing".

Over 30,000 deaths occurred due to liver failure in the country every year. Thus there was an urgent need for popularising organ donations, he said.