AN EYE FOR AN EYE – LITERALLY

The Mosaic Law of the Biblical Old Testament that advocated an eye for an eye was turned upside down in the New Testament with the Lord Jesus Christ asking his disciples to turn the other cheek. This dictum greatly influenced the non-violence preached by Mahatma Gandhi. Referring to the Mosaic Law Gandhiji had said that if everybody was to follow it then sooner or later the entire world would be blind.

Yet there are those who, quite literally, believe in giving an eye for an eye; to give sight to the sightless. That is through eye, or strictly speaking, cornea donation. I have been long associated with this movement, but it became personal when my mother-in-law Regina Carvalho (87) passed on recently, and we donated her corneas. I am writing this piece after meeting the recipients of those corneas. They received the gift of sight just two days before the festival of lights – Diwali. What better way to celebrate this sacred occasion?

The architect of this supreme giving is Dr Mahmood Rehmani M.S., D.M.O.S., the Director of the Shifa Eye Research Centre, Kanpur. He has transplanted 654 corneas with a 100% success rate. The other aspect of this amazing story is that all these transplants have been done free of cost or charge! When queried, the good doctor stated that in other renowned hospitals such a transplant could cost upto One and a Half Lakh Rupees.

Dr Rehmani embarked on this great mission sometime in 1990; and his first donor, if I recall correctly, was a Parsee lady, Roshan Merchant. The name is significant, for Roshan means light. But there were no merchants (commercial slant) involved, as so often happens today, where noble vocations like education and health are commercialized.

According to Dr Rehmani there are over One Crore sightless people in India alone. He himself has a waiting list of over 8000 for corneal transplants, and the list keeps growing. Each case is registered and monitored, and corrective treatment given before transplantation. 80% of the patients also suffer from cataract, so he first removes the cataract, implants an intra-ocular lens and then fixes the cornea. All free.

The good doctor says that anybody, at any age, and even those with cataract implants, can donate their corneas. The only ones who cannot are those infected with HIV/AIDS or Hepatitis B. The cornea is one part of the body that has no blood in it, so there is no need for blood group matching, as with other forms of organ donation.

Sri Lanka has the highest incidence of cornea donation, and sends corneas to 55 other countries. They only charge for postal services. Being a devout Muslim, Dr Rehmani did face some initial resistance from some clerics. So he obtained a certification from the Supreme Ulema Council of Saudi Arabia, expressing support for eye donation. Next month (November) there is going to be a conference of Ulemas (Muslim clerics) in Chennai, to debate the issue of corneal and liver transplants.

Dr Rehmani says that the instrumentation for corneal transplants alone costs Rupees 1.5 Crores. There is another machine that costs a similar amount. It can split the outer and inner layers of the cornea, whereby one donor can actually give sight to four persons. Surprisingly, this great service is bereft of Govt aid. Govts can shower crores on sportspersons who hit the bull’s-eye, but cannot see eye-to-eye with those who organise eye donations.

Though Dr Rehmani began this service in the 1990’s, it did not gather steam, as there was a drought of donors. That was until he met another indomitable spirit – Manoj Sengar of the Vishwa Gayatri Parivar. Sengar had launched a body donor’s movement “Yug Dadheechi Deh Daan Abhiyan” in 2003. Together with the donation of cadavers, to the anatomy department, he also began a simultaneous Netradaan (eye donation) campaign. The drought then turned into a flood.

Even on the body donation front, Kanpur has had a record of 126 donors. Not just the Kanpur medical college, but also those in the neighbouring districts of Lucknow, Allahabad and Agra, have benefited from Kanpur’s munificence. With such a glut, Sengar has written to the Union Health Minister, Dr Harsh Vardan, to establish a body bank in Kanpur, to preserve the bodies till they can be transferred to the anatomy departments of other medical colleges. Years ago, the father of modern anatomy, Dr Gray, had to dissect his own mother’s body, as he had no other source to turn to. Hopefully, this will no longer be a grey area for Indian anatomists. As with Sri Lanka in corneal transplants, Kanpur will lead the way in body donations, thanks to Sengar and Rehmani.

My mother-in-law was staying with us in Krishnanagar when she passed on. Former three-time Corporator, Madan Lal Bhatia of Krishnanagar says that though Krishnanagar is a small suburb of Kanpur, with a population of about 6,000, it has the highest incidence of eye donors in the city. This is because of the motivation given by a retired Airforce Warrant Officer Kundan Lal Bhatia.

Dr Rehmani avers that even the Sri Lankan phenomenon is because of proper motivation. May many more of us be motivated by Rehmani and Sengar, to give sight or life to others, through our cornea or cadaver donations. We can now literally say, “An eye for an eye”.

·         The writer and his wife, Meera, have both pledged their bodies for medical research

OCTOBER 2014