SRI VIVEKANANDA SEVASHRAMA

Sri Vivekananda sevashrama and its ideals of service. Swami Vivekananda Has said " serve the sick & the suffering people as Karmayogi". Sevashrama has more than 40 volunteers who have dedicated to this ideal of Swamiji. With this ideal in mind Sri Vivekananda Sevashrama started its service activities on October 2nd, Mahatma Gandhiji's birth anniversary during the year 1975. Sevashrama started its medical activities with two Sunday medical aid centers to serve the medical needs of the poor people of Vasantapura & Tataguni, Two villages near Bangaluru in Karnataka state, India. After 42 years these centers are still working in those same villages. More than 3 Lakh people... read more Sri Vivekananda sevashrama and its ideals of service. Swami Vivekananda Has said " serve the sick & the suffering people as Karmayogi". Sevashrama has more than 40 volunteers who have dedicated to this ideal of Swamiji. With this ideal in mind Sri Vivekananda Sevashrama started its service activities on October 2nd, Mahatma Gandhiji's birth anniversary during the year 1975. Sevashrama started its medical activities with two Sunday medical aid centers to serve the medical needs of the poor people of Vasantapura & Tataguni, Two villages near Bangaluru in Karnataka state, India. After 42 years these centers are still working in those same villages. More than 3 Lakh people have received medical attention during these 42 years of dedicated service. Cataract surgery project for elderly patients The main programme of giving sight to the sightless was started during the year 1981. Cataract surgery camps were conducted in remote places faraway from big cities where facilities are not available for surgery. Due to poverty and ignorance poor people could not get the medical attention for cataract surgery and remained blind due to cataract. Vision can be restored for cataract blind people with a simple operation with intra ocular lens in a sterile operation theater available near the place of residence of the patient. Sevashrama started its mobile surgical unit for conducting cataract surgeries with Intra ocular lens. A base hospital for eye care was inaugurated on 26th January, Republic day of India,during the year 1998. We have dedicated doctors who are helping us in our service programme, We have spread our wings far and wide to cover distant places beyond 500 KM from our base hospital. We cover Hydarabad Karnataka area which is very backward in all respects including health care. This area has a long list of backlog cataract cases. This list is growing longer every year by addition of new cases which are not attended to by either government doctors or by NGO's. After conducting surgery for more than a decade and conducting more than 38000 free IOL cataract surgeries at our mega cataract surgery camps in which we conduct around 300 surgeries in a two day camp, we have not been able to reduce the backlog cases in that area which we have chosen to conduct mega cataract surgery camps. We conduct around 4000 surgeries per year we cannot expand our activities due to financial constraints. we are looking for sponsors who can support our Sight to the sightless project activities. Government funding is meager and insufficient and unreliable, we do not know when we will receive the funds, may be after years. We do generate funds at our base hospital in Bangalore which is just sufficient to meet the running cost of the center. We have no alternative than to limit our activities to the resources we can mobilise during the year. This eye care project serves the needs of the elders who are blind due to cataract and other ailments of the eye. When finances are available we propose to take up other projects for diabetic retinopathy, Glaucoma Etc. We have established another base hospital at Hanumasagara in Kushtagi taluk of Koppal district, Karnataka. Sevashrama has conducted more than2500 cataract surgeries at this center. Vision care for school children We have projects for vision testing of school children, distribution of free spectacles and conducting free eye surgeries for children below 15 years of age, who require anesthesia for surgery. This facility has been provided at Mysuru with the active participation of Dr Ravishankar and his team at UshaKiran charitable eye hospital. Sevashrama has conducted 171 eye surgeries free of cost to poor children around Mysuru and surrounding areas. Sevashrama has examined more than a lakh of children for vision and distributed more than 5000 spectacles during these years. Slow learners project at Mysuru We have peculiar Situation in government primary schools. There is no annual examination, all students are sent to the next higher class whether they learn the subject or not, Some students do not learn anything at all including kannada, Local language, alphabets. They can neither read what is written on the blackboards nor read any lessons from the prescribed text books. These children drop out of the school sooner than later after entering high school. They are not mentally retarded children. Some time in the past they have fallen back in their class and no teacher has cared to help them in their studies and they have remained backward. These are the first generation children who have entered school. Their parents are uneducated and cannot help the child in their studies at home. We have this slow learners project to help the child who is no learner and needs to start from the beginning, right from Kannada alphabets and elementary mathematics. A specially trained teacher is appointed and sent to a nearby government primary school. With the help and cooperation of the head of the institution 10 to 12 slow learners are selected. A special room is allotted in the same school and the teacher take care of these child's special education needs. They have 500 hours in the first half and another 500 hours in the second half of the academic year. Some who are intelligent pick up the subject in first term itself and sent back to their original class and the rest completes the year. We have helped more than 200 children to learn basics and to continue their studies further. At present we have four specially trained teachers working in four primary schools. We have planned to open ten centers when finances are made available by some organisation. This is continuous project and we need continuous financial assistance at least for five years. Supporting Disability children's schools: Sri Vivekananda Sevashrama supports two schools for special children one in Mysuru and the other on way to KRS at PT Belagola. We take care of 50 mentally retarded and spastic children. Both are daycare centers. Both centers are run on donation from sponsors and is totally free for children. Free transport, food & play materials are provided for children. Physiotherapy is part of the programme. We are in the look out for sponsors who can extend continuous financial support to provide better facilities at the present schools and to extend support to other special schools, Livelihood project: Housewives and other rural women have some spare time in the afternoon after their daily chores. Poverty is there and an additional income is always welcome. Sri vivekananda sevashrama has established two tailoring schools one near Mysuru and the other at Hanumasagara in Koppal district. Paid teachers teach tailoring for these women so that they will learn some skill which will help them to generate additional income. 15 to 20 women attend each batch for 3 months. We have a programme to donate sewing machines for very poor people who are unable to procure the machine with their own resources. This project has helped more than 100 women to make a living on their own and to supplement their family. income. We do collect old & new materials like clothing, utensils, furniture, sewing machines, computers, food articles & other useful materials from people who wish to donate and give it to poor and needy people in villages around Mysuru & Hanuamasagara. We have lot of avenues through which we can serve the needy poor in villages, the field is unlimited. We have limited our activities to the resources which we mobilise through donors & well wishers.