Mumbai: Powai family prods societies to hold free medical camps for poor & needy

A weekly clinic for the underprivileged which was started by a Powai-based family has treated over 2,000 patients in the past one year.

Now, taking a step further, the family is now convincing residential societies in their area to start a once-a-month free treatment campaign for the workers visiting their premises.

Vikas Goel, along with his father-in-law Surindra Gupta, started a charitable trust called Sukrta Foundation in 2014. Under this foundation, they came up with an idea of giving free treatment for those who cannot afford expensive hospitals. They started the first clinic at the community center of their residential complex, Raheja Vihar. They operate the free clinic every Thursday afternoon.

"In Powai, we did a survey on hardships the economically backward people go through when someone is sick in their family. Often, we listen to our maids or watchmen talk about the expensive treatments they had to pay for or the bad service provided by the government hospitals. We wanted to do something in this field. Hence, we started with renting a clinic and hire a doctor for two hours a week," said Goel, who works in the banking sector and none of his family members have a medical background.

Every Thursday, Doctor Kirti Agarwal attends over 50 patients in the clinic. People visiting are often maids, watchmen, fruit and vegetable vendors and their families. "We are giving free consultancy and medicines to the patients.

Patients suffering from cough, cold, fever, diabetes and hypertension come in. Most of them come with their children suffering from basic ailments. Our patients are multiplying every week as this news about free treatment is spreading," informed Agarwal.

She added that there were many poor patients who did not get good treatment at government hospitals and spent thousands at a private clinic.

"The foundation approached us with this idea. We are a complex of 500 flats and have many domestic helps who rely only on BMC hospitals for medical aid. We have a similar camp set up on the first Wednesday of the month where a lot of our helpers visit with their families," said Amrik Singh Bhatia, resident of Lakes Florence, a society in Powai.