Dr. G. Venkataswamy
Dr. G. Venkataswamy, popularly known as ‘Dr. V’, graduated from Stanley Medical College, Chennai in 1944. He joined the Indian Army Medical Corps but had to retire in 1948 after developing rheumatoid arthritis. The condition became so severe that he was bedridden for over a year. For a time, he struggled even to walk and could not hold a pen in his badly crippled fingers.
Despite his condition, he returned to medical school and earned his diploma and master’s degree in Ophthalmology. Through his hard work and determination, Dr. V learned how to hold a scalpel and perform cataract surgery. Eventually, he was able to perform more than one hundred surgeries a day and over one hundred thousand successful eye surgeries during his lifetime!
Dr. V became a government doctor in Tamil Nadu and, during his service, he introduced a number of innovative programmes to deal with the problem of blindness in India, such as outreach camps in eye care, a rehabilitation centre for the blind, and the creation of a training programme for ophthalmic assistants. In recognition of his work in the fight against blindness, Dr. V received the Padmashree award in 1973 by the Government of India.
All this would have been enough and more for many. What Dr. V did after retirement was even more remarkable. In 1976, he founded Aravind Eye Hospital as an 11-bed facility in Madurai, Tamil Nadu. Dr. V named the hospital after the sage Sri Aurobindo, whose follower he was.
With 14 hospitals in Tamil Nadu, the Aravind Eye Care System is now one of the largest facilities in the world for eye care. With its mission to ‘eliminate needless blindness’, Aravind provides large volume, high quality and affordable care. Half of its patients receive services either free of cost or at steeply subsidized rate and yet the organization remains financially self-sustainable. Much importance is given to equity – ensuring that all patients are accorded the same high quality care and service, regardless of their economic status.
A critical component of Aravind’s model is the high patient volume, which brings with it the benefits of economies of scale. Aravind’s unique assembly-line approach increases productivity tenfold. Over 4.5 lakh eye surgeries or procedures are performed a year at Aravind. Since its inception, Aravind has handled more than 6 crore (65 Million) outpatient visits and performed more than 78 lakh (7.8 million) surgeries. The Aravind Eye Care System now serves as a model for India and the rest of the world.
Teams of doctors and nurses from Aravind regularly visit rural villages where they conduct ‘eye camps’ that screen patients for vision impairments. Those requiring glasses receive them on site. Patients requiring surgery are brought back to an Aravind hospital, where they receive surgery, room and board, return transport and a follow up visit at no charge. Each year Aravind hosts over 2500 camps, averaging 40 camps every week with 500 community partners.
As Tina Rosenberg wrote in the New York Times, “Aravind can practice compassion successfully because it is run like a McDonald’s with assembly-line efficiency, strict quality norms, brand recognition, standardization, consistency, ruthless cost control and above all, volume. Each year, Aravind does 60% as many eye surgeries as the United Kingdom’s National Health System, at one one-thousandth of the cost.” Since 1993, the Harvard Business School has distributed more than 150,000 copies of ‘In Service for Sight’ (their original case study on the Aravind model) to the top twenty business schools in the United States.
Dr. V. Venkataswamy remained a bachelor and lived with his younger brother G. Srinivasan and his family. Today, over 35 members across three generations of Dr. V’s family work at Aravind. He was a Gandhian and a disciple of the spiritual teachers Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. His friend and former President of India, Dr.A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, wrote, “In the Aravind experience I see the path we need to take, a transformation of life into a powerful instrument of right action.”
Dr. V died in 2006, but the Aravind System continues to function as it did during his lifetime.
Afterword: Perhaps the best book on Dr. V. and the Aravind story is Infinite Vision: How Aravind Became the World’s Greatest Business Case for Compassion, written by Pavithra Mehta (his grandniece) and Suchitra Shenoy. Pavithra Mehta describes the Aravind model in this YouTube video. Here is the website of the Aravind Eyecare System.
This is an example of the unconditioned mind that comes to the fore. Selfless service and compassion comes to people who are willing to perceive things without the past, without considering what is in it for me.. The effort gathers steam as the motto of service outweighs all petty considerations of this world. Obsession without desire/aspiration for oneself, and ensuring that human needs are met without choice, brings in the element of vitality and energy. It generates a whole clan of dedicated servers and an institution gets created without seeking. It describes the true nature of humanity and establishes humility among co-workers and those who are associated with it. There is an abundant joy while crossing each hurdle, which is instantaneous and rewarding, which comes without asking. Though it requires no comparison, the endeavor is as breath-taking as that of the services of Mother Theresa at the missionaries of Charity. Whether business or no business, humility and human compassion have a significant role to play in going beyond thoughts and into instant action, that brings abundant joy in the lives of people. Aravind Eyecare is a living example.