The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Blindness in India calls for research: Badrinath

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Apr 19, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Blindness in India calls for research: Badrinath

Staff Reporter

Physically challenged men and women given mobile phones

COMMUNITY WORK: S.S. Badrinath, Chairman, Sankara Nethralaya distributing mobile phones to visually challenged persons at a function in Chennai on Saturday. Dr. Mohan Rajan and Dr. Vasanthi Badrinath look on. — Photo: R. Ragu

CHENNAI: More ophthalmologists must come forward and take up research to find the causes of blindness in India, said S.S. Badrinath, Chairman, Sankara Nethralaya.

Giving away mobile phones to the physically challenged at a function held at Rajan Eye Care Hospital, Dr. Badrinath said that one in three blind people in the world lived in India.

He called on young ophthalmologists to consider taking up research, which had not been given as much importance as patient care.

"We need to find out why we have some problems in large numbers and find out how to reduce the incidence of cataract."

Also, of the 11,000 ophthalmologists in the country only 5,000 performed surgeries, he said.

Research was difficult and took a long time but ophthalmology did not mean performing cataract surgeries alone, he said, referring to Sankara Nethralaya's project to set up a research institute on its premises on College Road in Nungambakkam.

Dr. Badrinath lauded the efforts of Dr. Mohan Rajan and his wife in their ophthalmology-related community work.

As part of its corporate social responsibility initiative, Rajan Eye Care Hospital in T. Nagar gave away Nokia mobile phones to 10 visually challenged students from Swabodhini, a school for special children.

Volunteers of the eye camp received mobile sets on behalf of postgraduate and research students at Madras University who were affected by polio.

Cheques presented

Several members presented cheques to the cause of the research institute.

The alumni of Sankara Nethralaya, including Mohan Rajan, Sujatha Mohan and Murali Krishnan, who was the first student to pass out of Sankara Nethralaya, and Rajam Subramaniam, presented cheques to construct a building for a project of the Madras Research Foundation.

Ophthalmologist Vasanthi Badrinath, cricketer Sadagopan Ramesh, and chief executive of Careers India R. Kannan, who will sponsor cataract surgeries for 100 patients every month for a year were present.

Dr. Mohan Rajan said the hospital along with the Saroja Ramachandran Memorial Trust would bring quality eye care technology to the rural areas through the Chennai Vision Charitable Trust.

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