Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind (Sightsavers India)
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Mission Statement
We are a development organization working with partners in underserved areas of India to eliminate avoidable blindness and promote equal opportunities for people with disabilities.
About This Cause
Sightsavers India or Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind, is a development organization working with partners to reduce avoidable blindness and promote equality of opportunity for people with disabilities. Sightsavers India is collaborating with various departments of the respective state governments to scale up operations for Social Inclusion, Eye Health and Inclusive Education—our three core areas of work. We work in a sustainable way to promote lasting change by strengthening existing health systems, seeking to advocate with and influence governments, and by demonstrating best practices. Since 1966, Sightsavers India has performed over 6 million sight restoration surgeries, examined over 55 million people for eye ailments and provided eye treatments and spectacles to over 37 million people in India. Our Work Eye Health Rural eye health programme | Netra Vasant Urban eye health programme | Amrita Drishti National truckers eye health programme |RAAHI School eye health programme |Vidyajyoti Inclusive Education Social Inclusion Geography We work in 116 districts of 10 states namely Rajasthan, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, Bihar, Maharashtra and Assam. The Urban Eye Health programme is operational in 21 cities of India which include states like Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu etc. The states and districts are carefully selected based on eye health, disability and multidimensional poverty indicators. Eye Health National Rural Eye Health Programme—Netra Vasant A large population of our country still resides in villages. Netra Vasant aims at improving vision-related quality of life through strengthened eye health systems in rural areas of India. The programme aims to achieve universal coverage vis-a-vis eye health services in rural communities of the 100 selected districts by reducing blindness prevalence, providing equitable coverage, and financial & programmatic sustainability. National School Eye Health Programme—Vidyajyoti Sightsavers launched Vidyajyoti School Eye Health Programme with the goal that ‘good and maintained eye health’ is optimized in school children, so the improved learning outcomes in schools are evident. Vidyajyoti has achieved a historic scale by reaching out to more than 3.5 million students enrolled in government schools in the intervention districts while providing free spectacles to 50,000 children. Under the programme, we provide eye health services for students of rural districts attending government, non-government semi-aided private schools in the age group 5-18 (up to class-12), improving learning outcomes and enabling early detection. Urban Eye Health Programme—Amrita Drishti We work in metropolitan cities to ensure comprehensive and sustainable eye health mechanisms for the urban slums of India. Simultaneously, Sightsavers is working closely with the Ministry of Health and the National Urban Health Mission. Amrita Drishti integrates its vision centres with the government's Urban Primary Health Centres (UPHCs). In addition to providing direct services, this enables Sightsavers India to ease disadvantaged beneficiaries into the public health system through strengthened referral mechanisms, especially for cataracts. The Programme launches healthcare Mobile Vans that offer various services – Teleconsultation, Glaucoma and Diabetic Retinopathy screening, Portable perimetry, ready to clip (R2C) glasses and spectacle sale. National Truckers Eye Health Programme—RAAHI One of India's most extensive eye health programmes, RAAHI, focuses on ensuring road safety by providing eye care services to the truckers’ community. The programme is spread across 54 locations across the golden quadrilateral and North South-East West (NSEW) network. The Programme is designed so that eye care services reach overworked truck drivers and commercial drivers at their convenience. We have permanent vision centres and pop-up outreach camps in locations where drivers stop as part of their usual route to rest or unload cargo. The use of fully equipped mobile ophthalmology van under the programme makes eye health more accessible for the commercial driving community. Social Inclusion Programme We work to equip people with disabilities with the skills (daily living, vocational training, etc.), tools and assistance they need to earn a living and lead an independent life. To enable the Social Inclusion of people with disabilities, we focus on three core areas: Institution Building, Economic Empowerment, and Enabling Environment. Sightsavers India advocates for all 21 disabilities as outlined under the RPwD Act 2016, with a focus on the eight prominent disabilities. With a comprehensive approach to gender, we also provide adolescent girls with self-defense training and health and hygiene sessions. Inclusive Education Programme Sightsavers aims to promote a positive and enabling environment in schools, families as well as communities to support the holistic education of children with visual impairment. Enablement is facilitated by availability of assistive devices and accessible educational material, provision of compensatory skills training, infrastructure accessibility and building education management and leadership among others. Under the Inclusive Education Programme, we ensure that children who are blind or visually impaired are included in mainstream education. This is crucial to lifting people out of poverty.