Eye bank’s campaign inspires 3.50 lakh to donate eyes posthumously

AMRAVATI: ‘Roshani Zindagi Mein,’ a novel project being run across the state by the inspired volunteers of the Amravati-based Deesha Eye Bank for creating awareness about eye donation, has succeeded in motivating 3.50 lakh people to resolve to donate their eyes posthumously.
The eye bank, run by the local Deesha Group, has been doing a great job of putting sight into the eyes of the sightless and creating awareness in people about eye donation.It is an inspired group of 1800 volunteers, mostly engineering students, spread across the state.
The eyes of 12-year-old Kimaya Raju Mankar, a Std. VII student of Holy Cross School who met with a tragic death in a road mishap at Panchawati square on Wednesday morning while on her way to school, could be donated, thanks to the resolve she had made at such a young age.
“We are motivating people to resolve for posthumous eye donation. We organize camps and show videos where we impress upon people the importance of eye donation and remove misconceptions about it. We also organize free eye check-up camps for autorickshaw drivers, policemen, students etc and arrange for the surgeries and spectacles, if any eye ailment is found,” said Swapnil Arun Gawande, trustee of Deesha Group and secretary of Deesha Eye Bank. Swapnil is pursuing his engineering degree at Ram Meghe Institute of Technology and Research, Badnera.
“When I was a young boy of seven, I was learning music. That time I came in contact with some blind students at my music class. That aroused my curiosity in them. It was then that I decided to do something for them. When I joined engineering, I formed Deesha Group and launched awareness programmes. Our group runs by donations and trustees are not paid any honorarium. So, the entire money received by donations is spent on the cause,” he said.
To further his cause, Swapnil established Deesha Eye Bank last year and launched Roshani Zindagi Mein drive across the state with the help of 1,800 volunteers spread in cities like Amravati, Kolhapur, Satara, Sangli and Pune. The volunteers are mostly would-be engineers and a few are doctors. “To date more than 3.50 lakh have resolved to donate eyes posthumously. We want to create a database and put it online for use of active eye banks in every district,” he said.
Swapnil has applied for setting up six more eye banks. “The proposals for Yavatmal and Baramati are in the pipeline,” he said. “ We want doctors who work with passion for service to society. We also want to set up a keratoplasty unit here so that eye transplant can be done here only.
Swapnil is guided by Padmashree Dr. Tatyarao Lahane, dean, JJ Hospital and Padmavibhushan Dr. KH Sancheti of Pune in his mission. Swapnil has now set his eyes on compiling data of all blind persons with the type of their blindness in Amravati district.