GLOBETROTTING Inverclyde eye consultant Dr Sadhu Gupta is on his way around the world again to restore sight to poor people.

He is returning to his homeland of India to help local doctors attend to people who would otherwise not be able to get treatment.

This is the 16th time the 70-year-old physician has taken his ‘eye camps’ to developing countries such as India, Pakistan, Nepal, Ethiopia, Myanmar and Bangladesh, where he held the first one in 1985.

His team have brought back the gift of sight to around 3,000 over the years by removing cataracts and replacing eye lenses, allowing people to return to a normal life instead of depending on others.

This time they are returning to the two sites they visited last year, when 200 were treated.

It is hoped to help a similar number of 40 to 80-year-olds on this trip, which will run from 2 to 17 September and cost £10,000.

Dr Gupta, who worked at Inverclyde Royal for 29 years, and nurse Danny Chundoo of Greenock, who has been on many of the missions, said it was an opportunity to help people at two locations, although they are many miles apart.

They were accompanied last year by Dr Gupta’s wife, Pushpa, a retired paediatrician who worked at IRH for 30 years, and she will be with them again this time.

The team will be working in collaboration with the National Society for the Prevention of Blindness in India.

The first site will involve four days in Raison Hospital, a small town 14 hours along bumpy roads by bus from Delhi.

And the second site is a two-hour flight from Delhi to Gujarat province for a five-day stint in the village of Mandvi at Tejas Eye Charitable Hospital.

Dr Gupta will also conduct seminars and lectures with medical staff, and clinical training for junior doctors in current ophthalmic surgical techniques.

He said: “We’re looking forward to the challenge. It makes us very happy to see the joy in people’s faces when their eyesight is restored.” Dr Gupta said the visits wouldn’t be possible without the generosity of many people, including some of the patients who have been helped on previous missions, former patients at IRH and members of Greenock and Gourock Rotary clubs.

He is a member of Gourock Rotary, while Danny is a member of Greenock and also chair of Rotary International West of Scotland District.

Danny said: “It gives us a great deal of satisfaction to help people. They are very grateful for what we do for them.” Anyone who would like to help the eye camps can do so by donating to the ‘Drishti Eye Camp Project’ at the Royal Bank of Scotland.