Project Prakash Foundation

The mission of Project Prakash is to help improve the lives of children with disabilities through medical treatment, rehabilitation and education, and to undertake scientific research into the causes of, and therapies for, the disabilities.India shoulders the world’s greatest burden of childhood blindness, with over a million children suffering from severe visual impairment. Over 90% of them are unable to obtain an education and fewer than 50% survive to adulthood. More than 80% are unemployed as adults. Remarkably, in well over half of the cases, the blindness is treatable or preventable. Most children, however, never receive medical care because the treatment facilities are concentrated in major cities, while much of the population lives in villages. These circumstances effectively ensure that a blind child in a financially strapped rural family will live a dark and tragically short life. The goal of the Prakash Center is to address this humanitarian crisis by: 1. Providing treatment to curably blind children, 2. Helping them gain an education, and 3. Conducting scientific research to discover better therapies and rehabilitation procedures.