Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti has offered to donate her one eye for a 14-year-old girl rendered blind by pellets fired by security forces controlling the ongoing unrest in the Valley. But the teen may do just fine with a modern scientific procedure called bionic eye transplant, the expenditures of which her family is unable to afford.
The girl has been identified as Insha Malik from south Kashmir's Shopian district. She didn't take part in the protests, but was hit while sitting inside her house.
Insha was rushed from Srinagar to All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), but doctors have said that she may be blinded for life.
Like Insha, there are many Kashmiri youths staring at a dark future because of the permanent damage caused to their eyes by the pellets.
Now, eye surgeons are referring to bionic eye transplant as the only way by which the pellet injured could see again, Rising Kashmir reports. However, the bionic eye that consists of photoreceptors, camera, and electrodes is only transplanted in countries such as Singapore and the United States.
"The treatment cost for each patient may go up to Rs. 10 lakh," Tariq Qureshi, head of Department of Ophthalmology at Government Medical College (GMC) in Srinagar, was quoted as saying.
In Valley, a group of doctors called Doctors Association of Kashmir has also urged locals to raise funds for overseas treatment of the pellet-hit in Kashmir.
"The implant costs minimum 10 lakh rupees in Singapore for a patient. Let's begin with Insha to raise funds for her surgery and treatment. Other 29 patients hit with pellets on both eyes still have some hope left to regain vision," Qureshi said.
The DAK is actively raising funds to treat injured in Kashmir whose number has spiralled to 8,000 out of which 3,912 were hit by pellets.
