Can you imagine how difficult it is for a visually-challenged person to negotiate the madness of the city, each day? In order to sensitise us to the challenges of their everyday life, and thereby motivate us to donate our eyes, The Project Vision (TPV) is organising the Bangalore Blind Walk.
Three hundred visually challenged people will lead 1,500 others who will blindfold themselves for a kilometre-long walk.
Spread over three days during the National Eye Donation Fortnight (August 25 to September 8), observed in India, the project hopes to find more volunteers and ambassadors who’ll bridge the gap and help people who pledge their eyes to actually be able to donate it after their death.
Fr. George Kannanthanam, director of TPV, says that many people willingly pledge eyes, but don’t have any connect with any hospital. So when they die, their corneas don’t reach the hospital.
“Every third blind person in the world is an Indian — India has 15 million blind people, out of the 39 million world over. While it's a reality that not all of them can get their vision back, at least 20 per cent, who have corneal blindness can get their vision back if they get corneal transplants,” says Fr. George. Nearly 35,000 corneas are collected all over the country annually while the waiting list is over a lakh per year, he points out the disconnect in numbers. He offers other mind-boggling numbers. While 4,20,000 people died in Karnataka in 2013, only 3,500 donated their corneas.
He started The Project Vision with 50 other volunteers in October 2013 to make eye donation a norm in society. He had lived with leprosy affected and blind people in the Sumanahalli Society for 12 years and was inspired to start this movement, because of that experience, he says.
“Eyes are burnt or buried and lost forever. We thought we need a movement in the country that involves various organisations, companies, religious outfits, apartment associations — that can influence people's opinion. We are also in the process of creating Vision Ambassadors who will bridge the gap between people who pledge eyes and when the time comes to actually donate...someone from within a company, apartment or community.” Over 1,000 people have signed up as Vision Ambassadors till date. “Our aim is to make Bangalore the eye donation capital of the world,” he says. He also quotes examples of Sri Lanka which exports corneas because Buddhist religion dictates that you must donate eyes. Spain too has a law to the effect that after you die, your eyes belong to your country. “Why can't we create such legislations?”
The walks, conceived by fellow volunteer Anand Doddanna, will be held on three days — you can participate on any one day. The first walk will be held on August 24 on M.G.Road, the second is on August 31 in Jayanagar, and the third is on September 7 in Yeshwantpur.
Each visually challenged person will lead a group of about five people. Awareness programmes, street plays, entertainment programmes by the blind are also part of the event.
While the event is open to 1,500 people across three days as of now, 1,000 registrations have been confirmed. There is no registration fee. To check details and register, log on to >http://walk.theprojectvision.org
