Free Eye check-up camp and distribution of spectacles…

SETU is committed to provide access to quality healthcare to its associated artisan groups. To achieve this goal, we conduct health camps at regular intervals. In the series, we organised an eye check-up camp for our partner artisan group, ‘SURE’ , an NGO based in Barmer, Rajasthan. The camp was conducted for a period of four days starting from 24th June to 27th June 2019. It was organised in four remote villages near Chohtan and a large number of artisans showed up at the camp.

We are working with the group for many years now and the artisans here, predominantly women, are engaged in minute embroidery work and make beautiful merchandise like bags, cushions etc.. Hand embroidery and applique are popular craft forms in this region and majority of the artisan families are dependent on them as the sole source of income. SETU provides marketing platform to such talented artisan groups and also help in the designing of products as per the need of the contemporary markets. Last year, SETU had organised a skill development workshop for the group through which many women artisans got benefited as they were able to learn the new set of skills in embroidery. The workshop also helped many young artisans to take up embroidery as their choice of work.

The craft form requires very minute work to be done, thus requiring a good eye-sight. A regular eye check-up is essential for these artisans. The artisans come from economically weak sections of the society and cannot afford to get the checkups done by themselves. Thus, to provide them with quality eye checkups, the camp was organised.

The eye check-up camp was conducted at four villages namely Navatala, Binjarad, Dadusar and Mithrau. In each of the places, the camp started daily from 10 am to 4 pm. A team of qualified doctors & opticians was hired, who carried all the required equipment & machinery to the camps. In addition to the women artisans, elderly people also attended the camp and got benefited. A total of 351 people participated and 167 people got their choice of spectacles for free.. 47 people were referred to a renowned eye hospital, where they got eye surgeries done.

Those who were advised optical correction glasses were provided with free of cost spectacles. Eyeglass frames were chosen by people according to their preference. Artisans were very happy for the services provided in the camp and for the free medicines and spectacles and want more such health camps to be organised in future..