Activities Community ServiceOUR FOCUS |
Rotary Club of Trivandrum Fort | |
| Caring for the Old
|
 Caring for those Who Cared for Us Old Age Home at Chackai, Trivandrum houses 103 men and women above 70, abandoned by their children and relatives. Our Club has a special fascination for this institution. Our members and their families spent one or two days in a year on the festive occasions of Onam and Christmas , provide them with new clothes and dine along with them in the traditional manner, bringing back the happiness and contentment of the festivals they would have enjoyed with their kith and kin ! Our children feel happy in their company hearing from them the long forgotten folklore. The Club has provided two nursing assistants to help those who are confined to beds or need medical help. It is our wish to continue this project for this year also, by adding the services of a geriatric physician. Rotary Club of St. Charles, Missouri, RI District 6060, has kindly offered to participate in this sacred venture during 2001-02. So far members of this club have already sent us US$ 500 and a box of spectacle frames and hearing aids (in transit as of February 25, 2002) It is the major obsession of our Club. The disabled is our weakness. We go all out to help them. In October 1974 our members took twenty amputees and polio afflicted children and twenty escorts to Bangalore, 800 kms away from Trivandrum, to obtain for them artificial limbs and calipers. The entire expense until their return home was met by the members by individual contribution. Two of the Past Presidents who had accompanied the Group, Dr. J.M.I. Sait and Dr. K.G. Radhakrishnan worked as volunteers at the camp and received training on all administrative and organizational matters relevant to such camps. In November 1975, three camps were conducted under the supervision of Dr. Sait, at Sivakasi, Tirunelveli and Nagercoil seriatim, where a total of about 3,000 handicapped persons were provided with limbs / calipers free of cost. Eight Clubs in Alleppey District, one each at Adoor and Changanacherry also conducted similar Camps while he was the District Chairman for Assistance to disabled. A major Artificial Limb Camp was organized in Trivandrum in January 2001, where 914 persons received artificial limbs and calipers absolutely free. The beneficiaries and their escorts numbering about 2,200 were accommodated at the camp premises and were provided with food until the appliances could be fabricated, fitted, trial given and the patients departed. The project was jointly sponsored by the Rotary Club of Barnsley Rockley, England, UK, District 1270 through the kind cooperation of Rotary Jaipur Limb Project Trust, UK. under a Matching Grant. Rtn. Dr. Sait and Rtn. R. Radhakrishnan Nair are now coordinating with the Rotary Club of Nagercoil South for a similar Camp to be conducted in Nagercoil, from March 11 to 20, 2002 this year. In addition to this we used to provide wheel chairs and tricycles to those who were absolutely immobile, during our annual functions. During 1996-'97 five hundred hearing impaired persons, young and old, were provided with free hearing aids, some 400 persons were given spectacles collected from USA. Regularly every year we distribute uniforms to one hundred needy children; adopt 3 to 5 students at primary and secondary schools, and provide learning materials to about 50. Rotary Community Corps of Sreevarham Mukkolakkal joins the Club in all its educational assistance programmes and supplements its endeavours. The Club has adopted the Pattom Thanu Pillai Memorial Upper Primary School under the Adoption of Schools Programme of the District. Members take very active part in the Polio immunization programme, particularly on the National Immunization Days, collecting the vaccine, reaching the vaccine and the vaccinators to the vaccination booths and back, providing food and refreshments to the volunteers and vaccinators at selected booths. Dr. J.M.I. Sait spent four fortnights as Inter District Volunteer, in Uttar Pradesh during December 2000, January 2001, December 2001, January 2002 NIDs and April, May 2001 pre-emptive mop up, motivating the Rotarians and the sections of the community which were reluctant to accept polio vaccination. Hepatitis B. Vaccine was being sold in the city at Rs. 300 (US$ 7) an infant dose while the real cost was below Rs. 60 ($ 1.40). The Club initiated a campaign for mass immunization at basic cost. The first camp held in 1998-99 provided 2,000 persons (6,000 doses) with vaccine at basic price and gave 3,000 doses free of cost to poor children. Following this example, other clubs in the district conducted similar camps for their communities. Once in every two years, a medical camp is conducted in a remote area where the normal government sponsored medical facilities do not reach. At these camps all the major disciplines are represented, with cancer detection receiving priority. An exclusive cancer detection camp was conducted in a remote village in Trivandrum District and at Tirunelveli, where a large number of cancer cases, particularly cervical, were detected. The last medical camp was conducted in Pozhiyoor fishing village, with the whole population living below poverty line, characterised by acute malnutrition and focused on elderly people and infants. Average attendance at these camps used to range between 1,200 and 2,000 with not less than 15 doctors and 20 paramedical personnel serving along all the members of the club. Two major projects were conducted by the Club under Matching Grants. The first project commisioned in 1997-98 provides safe drinking water to 500 plus primary school children and neighbouring families in a remote village in Ooroottambalam. The project was sponsored by the Rotary Club of Pequannock Valley, New Jersey, USA, District 7470. The second project was constructed in 2000-01 to provide water for a community of 60 households living at the top of a hill, the nearest water source for them being 500 meters down the hill; water used to be carried uphill by small children, leading to dropping out of schools. The Project was sponsored by the Rotary Club of Burwood, Australia, Dist 9470. Under the Preserve the Planet Earth Programme, it is the usual custom of the Club to plant 100 to 150 saplings of fruit trees every year in schools and other premises. All the members and their families join in the campaign. A picture gallery is being developed.
Part of it can be viewed. Club Service Vocational Service International Service New Generation Service Home
|
