Telangana: Giving the gift of sight, Kanti Velugu surges ahead

The eye screening for vision problems for adults are being conducted at the Village or ward level and 1,500 teams would work for the next 100 working days.

Hyderabad: Ramulamma, a 60-year-old from Kethepalli mandal in Nalgonda district, had a long sight problem. On learning about a Kanti Velugu camp in the vicinity, she attended the camp and the doctors examined her before prescribing and offering her a spectacles with a power of -5 for free.

Similarly, Gaddam Vijaya, a resident of Ambedkarnagar of Rajanna Sircilla, also had sight problems but could not afford an eye checkup. She attended the Kanti Velugu camp in the area where doctors examined and offered spectacles free to her. Sporting the spectacles, she is all smiles.

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The second edition of Kanti Velugu programme, which was launched by Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao at Khammam on January 18, is helping many elderly people, especially those in rural areas to overcome their eyes-related problems free of cost.

Due to effective coordination among different departments in organizing the Kanti Velugu programme, many people are attending the camps across the State. Telangana government launched the programme with a mission to ensure “Blindness-Free Telangana”. The eye screening for vision problems for adults are being conducted at the Village or ward level and 1,500 teams would work for the next 100 working days.

On the first day of the programme, nearly 1.60 lakh people attended the programme in 522 urban camps and 978 rural camps spread across the State. The eye testing teams had identified 70,256 patients with certain eye related ailments and 37,046 patients were provided with reading glasses instantaneously. For the remaining 33,210 patients the prescribed spectacles would be provided in due course.

In the Hyderabad urban limits, 1500 teams were deployed and these teams would undertake the eye screening and vision test for all the citizens irrespective of their age group. Till Friday, a total of 12.79 lakh persons, including 6.79 lakh women and 625 transgenders, were covered in the eye testing process.

Kanti Velugu details till Friday

– Number of people screened: 12.79 lakh (male 5.88 lakh and 6.79 lakh)

– Reading glasses handed over: 2.94 lakh

– Spectacles prescribed: 2.05 lakh

– People with no eye related issues: 7.79 lakh