Healthcare

Remember the 2004 Bollywood film in which an NRI Mohan Bhargava (played by Shah Rukh Khan) returns to India and is moved by the harsh realities faced by the people in his village to become an agent of change? The name of that film was Swades, and here is an organization called Swades Foundation that shares a similar mission - to bring about change in rural India. To know how they are doing this, read more.

There are several people our society does not accept willingly. The leprosy-affected and the mentally handicapped are some of them. Imagine an entire village dedicated to them, where they can live freely and without prejudice, and receive loving care and attention from dedicated staff. This is what Sahyog Kushtha Yagna Trust in Gujarat attempts to achieve.

Imagine someone who cannot walk and has no hope of even having the gift of walking on his own two feet. Polio Foundation has been relentlessly working for 25 years to bring in a ray of light in such darkened lives! Since its birth in Ahmedabad in 1987, the foundation has been striving to fulfill its objective of aiding the physically handicapped children by way of corrective surgery and giving them necessary appliances so that they can walk on their feet without anybody's assistance. This does not merely bring about physical gratification; it also has tremendous impact upon the psychological development of the child coupled with immense happiness to the family. All treatments, care and calipers are provided without any cost to the patients.

Organ donation is still a relatively fledgling concept in India, and people are still grappling its moral, social, religious and other implications in the Indian context. Mohan Foundation has been promoting organ donation since 1997, and helps people understand what it entails - the rewards, the fears and the process. In the end, you could be gifting life to not one but several beneficiaries.

A unique concept - boat clinics - are offering crucial medical assistance, advice on family planning, and most importantly, hope to the millions living in the many small, flood-prone islands in Assam where hospitals and dedicated medical centres are unheard of, and at many times in the year, inaccessible.

Aneesha Menon, an India Water Portal Fellow, travels with The Nirmal Bharat Yatra (Great WASH Yatra) to understand the mindset in rural India on health and sanitation issues and to educate young girls on menstrual cycle and hygienic practices. While the lack of awareness is shocking, Aneesha finds an eagerness to learn and adapt which is encouraging. On visiting two schools to take a survey, she is happy to note that their visit seems to have left a positive impact on the young minds.

An accredited social health activist (ASHA) in her remote, often flood-ravaged village in Odisha, Pankajani not only saves lives on a daily basis but goes way beyond her call of duty to be available to her wards at all times spreading awareness, dispensing advice and curing ills. Her dedication is plainly visible as she recalls painful memories of last year's floods in Odisha and the steps she took to ensure that the situation in her village remained under control.

Dr. Mapuskar has been working relentlessly in the field of rural sanitation for over 50 years now, and helped develop many innovative methods and technologies to create a sanitation revolution even before it was the rising concern that it is today. His principles of community ownership and his search for appropriate technology that suits the Indian conditions have left a legacy that can be adopted all over the nation for maximum impact. He is truly a TBI Hero.

Laughter Heaven is a silent laughing club in Bandra suburb of Membai which has given hope, joy and smiles to a lot of elders who meet every morning to share, celebrate, laugh together and improve mental, physical and spiritual fitness.