To recognise and honour the work of eye hospitals working to serve the underprivileged in the community, Sewa Sadan Eye Hospital Trust, Bhopal instituted an award – “Sant Hirdaram Netra Sewa Samman’ for innovative eye care practices to reach the unreached.
The award was launched in 2023. It carries a cash prize of Rs. 1,01,000 and a memento.
The ‘Sant Hirdaram Netra Sewa Samman’ for innovative eye care practices to reach the unreached in its second year was awarded to Sankar Nethralaya – the well-known eye hospital from Chennai. Dr. R.R. Sudhir, Senior Consultant from the hospital received the award at the 18th Vision 2020 India national conference held at Ludhiana. Punjab State Congress President and MP, Ludhiana, Shri Amarinder Singh Raja, the chief guest gave away the award.
The award is to be presented at the VISION 2020: The Right to Sight – INDIA’s national annual conference.
In its maiden year, this prestigious award was conferred to Siliguri Greater Lions Eye Hospital, Siliguri, West Bengal at the 17th annual conference of VISION 2020 INDIA held at Gomabai Nethralaya, Neemuch, MP on 27 August 2023.
Nisha Solanki belongs to a large family of two brothers and four sisters (of whom 3 are married). Both her brothers and elder sister attend school. Nisha’s father is mentally challenged. The responsibility of earning is on the mother, who is a daily wage farm labourer and grandmother, who tends to her goats. Two earing members for a family of ten.
Blindness in children leads to deep impact on psychological, emotional, and socioeconomic growth to the family. A child with blindness is more likely to have delays in developmental milestones, to be more frequently hospitalized, and die during childhood than a sighted child. Such severe vision loss also adversely effects the educational activities, orientation, and mobility from the early stage of life resulting in lack of employment privilege. These differential characteristics between a sighted and non-sighted child is more obvious in developing countries. Moreover, the disability adjusted life years (DALY) loss in a blind child is far more than that of adults with blindness.