Sankara Nethralaya Successfully completes Two MESU eye camps in Jharkhand. India

By: Meher Lanka

On a bright and rather hot afternoon in Gandey, Jharkhand, at 3.21 p.m. on 7 of April, ’25, two 42 feet long, 10 feet wide-bodied buses , one behind the other, were spotted rolling down in Katras towards the Community Health Center, Gandey, two full days ahead of the eye-camp’s start date. These were the Mobile Eye Surgical Unit (MESU) buses of Sankara Nethralaya making their way to the camp site. Due to the upcoming Sri Rama Navami celebrations and to avoid any religious issues affecting the movement of the MESU Unit, they were mobilized to arrive a day sooner than required. Gandey is a rural village and part of the coal and mica mining area of Giridih district. Information of the upcoming free Eye Cataract Surgery Camp was made by audio speakers mounted on autorickshaws for 2 weeks leading to the Camp’s start dates.
The founder of Sankara Nethralaya, Padma Bhushan Dr. S.S. Badarinath, was a true visionary who envisaged sending experienced doctors and support staff in buses to serve patients in the remotest parts of the country. These MESU units of Sankara Nethralaya were unique in the sense that unlike other establishments that used a mobile unit to perform eye screening only, they served the patients that could not afford to visit urban hospitals, in their own neighborhood, without having to travel to a nearby town or city . He offered them a world-class operation theatre on wheels - facilities that the needy would otherwise have no access to quality eyecare at no cost.

While Sankara Nethralaya was established in 1978, the Chennai MESU Unit was the very first MESU Unit and was established and operational in Chennai in 2011. The Jamshedpur MESU Unit was established and operational in Chaibasa, Jharkhand in 2016, with the support of TATA Steel. These units are specially designed, by IIIT Madras, the insides of which are made of surgical steel. One of the buses is used as a pre-screening section prior to a patient going into the Operation Theater. The second bus is also similar but used to pre-screen patients immediately prior to performing the surgery. These buses are parked side by side and connected by specially designed vestibule for patient movement between the buses. The buses have a power generator to supply power to Operation Theater 24x7 and to an adjacent building if required. These buses once positioned are covered by a metal shed so as to continue the entire camp, regardless of the inclement weather. TATA Steel has been the primary sponsor and conducts these camps in remote villages up to a 500km distance.

This is the first time the SNUSA President and Sankara Ratna Bala Indurti, influenced donors, to contribute to the Adopt-a-Village Program in Jharkhand and secured spots for conducting the MESU camps.
Since Bala Indurti took on the role as the President of SNUSA, 7 years ago, 2 MESU Units to the Hyderabad Telangana and Puttaparthi Andhra Pradesh locations have been added. The MESU Chennai unit established in 2011, by Padma Bhushan Dr. S.S. Badrinath, has to date, conducted 137 eye camps, screening of 124,664 patients and performing 19550 surgeries. The MESU Jharkhand unit established in 2016, sponsored by Ratan Tata, has conducted 114 eye camps, screening of 51,202 patients and performed 12,564 surgeries, of which two camps were sponsored by SN USA donors.
The MESU Hyderabad started operations in 2024 and was sponsored by SNUSA under the leadership of the Founder SV Acharya and President Bala Reddy Indurti. This unit has so far conducted 20 eye camps, screening of 19,967 patients and has performed 2,354 surgeries. The MESU Puttaparthi Unit was operation in Feb 2025, and was also sponsored by SNUSA, Anand Dasari and Moorthy Rekapalli. Sankara Nethralaya appreciated the Board of Advisors Anand Dasari and Treasurer Moorthy Rekapalli for their monetary support. This unit has so far conducted 2 eye camps, screening of 1,217 patients and performed 176 surgeries. While the MESU Ettayapuram Unit will be deployed to field in August, 2025, the MESU Visakhapatnam Unit will be deployed to field in 2026.

The 113th Mobile Eye Surgical Unit (MESU) Camp of the Jamshedpur MESU Unit was held in Gandey in Giridih district in Jharkhand, India from 9 to 17 April’25. The camp was inaugurated by the MLA and Deputy Chief Minister, Smt. Kalpana Murmu Soren, on 9 April, ’25 in Gandey. The eye screening of patients was performed from the morning of 9 to 12 April. This was followed by four days of free cataract surgeries from 13 to 17 April. The staff operating the camp were from the Sankara Nethralaya Hospital in Kolkata.
The camp was very successful as 692 patients were screened over 4 days. Free Cataract surgeries for 74 patients selected from 106, were successfully performed without any complications in the specially designed Mobile Eye Surgical Unit (MESU). Another 86 complex surgeries to be performed for free were referred to the main Hospital in Kolkata and Chennai.

This Camp would not have been possible without the generous contribution of the Sponsor, Sri Kannan Venkateshwar in honor of his living parents, Sri C.U. Venkateshwar and Smt. Shanta Venkateshwar. They were planning to travel from Jamshedpur to Gandey, but due to a personal exigency were unable to attend the camp. On the closing day, mementoes were presented to all SN staff, and volunteers by the BOXA Trust.
The second SNUSA sponsored MESU Camp, the 114th Camp of the Jamshedpur MESU Unit was held in a remote village, Mohanpur in Giridih district from 30 April to 8 May’25. The camp was inaugurated by Shri Sudivya Kumar Sonu, Cabinet Minister of Jharkhand, at Shri Shishu Vidya Mandir. Mohanpur is a rural village and part of the agricultural and mining area of Giridih district.

In this camp ,the eye screening was extended from 4 to 6 days and with 4 surgery days. On day 5 and 6, the camp had both eye screening and eye surgeries in parallel to increase the opportunities for patients to attend the camp. The114th Jharkhand MESU camp was very successful as 592 patients were screened over 6 days. The free Cataract surgeries for 74 patients from 113 patients were successfully performed without any complications in the specially designed Mobile Eye Surgical Unit (MESU). Another 74 complex surgeries to be performed for free, were referred to the main Hospital in Kolkata and Chennai.
For every patient that had the cataract surgery an interocular lens was placed in their eye to give them vision immediately after surgery. All patients were treated as Outpatients and were given a pair of dark/ black glasses. After one month, they would be given a pair of reading glasses also at no cost.
All patients that required more complex treatment of their eyes were asked to visit either the Sankara Nethralaya Hospital in Kolkata or for certain specific ailments to the Sankara Nethralaya Hospital in Chennai. The cost of the visits to the patient and one attendant is nil, and Sankara Nethralaya covers the cost of stay and meals. The patient has to pay only for their travel costs and visit only after receiving a confirmation of the scheduled appointment dates.

This Camp would not have been possible without the generous contribution of the Sponsor, Smt. Swarnim Kanth and Sri Kartik Ramakrishnan, residents of Atlanta, GA, USA.
To execute the camp smoothly and successfully, Meher Lanka, Trustee of SNUSA, identified and selected a Local Sponsor, an Alumni Association of St Xavier’s School Bokaro, BOXA Trust, of which he himself is an alumnus. The founder of BOXA Trust, Sri Arvind Chopra helped with the local logistics, had men and women alumni volunteers available to support the camp. Some of the volunteers were Tej Bahadur, Amardeep Kumar, Anita Kumari and Anjali Singh. Arvind facilitated obtaining of the approvals without any hiccups for conducting the MESU camps in the district, facilitated support for ambulances drop patients to their homes after surgery, bring some patients to the venue for surgery in inclement weather, and took care of the meals for the SN Staff and volunteers. Night police patrol arrangements were also arranged for the security of the MESU buses. There was very good coverage from the local news media in reporting of the camp’s progress.

On the closing day, mementoes were presented to all SN staff, all school teachers and volunteers. In appreciation of the children’s school that provided their premises to conduct the screening and hosting the camp for the 9 days, BOXA Trust, installed an RO Water Filtering System at the school.
Sankara Nethralaya thanks the Sponsors Kannan Venkateshwar for MESU Jharkhand Camp #113 and Swarnim Kanth and Kartik Ramakrishnan (for MESU Jharkhand Camp #114) and Local Sponsor BOXA Trust for their service at both MESU camps #113 and #114, to the needy and marching another step closer to eliminating preventable blindness in rural India.
 

Bala Reddy Indurti thanked Sankara Nethralaya Chairman Dr. S. Surendran, President Dr. Girish Rao, General Manager Suresh Kumar, Project Coordinators Koushik Adhikary, Ujjal Sinha and Sankara Nethralaya USA Founder Sri SV Acharya, EVP Shyam Appali and Secretary Vamsi Eruvaram, and the Trustee Meher Lanka for providing unconditional support to these MESU camps. Pl.visit www.SankaraNethralayaUSA.org for more information.