On Thursday LV Prasad Eye Institute opened an Indian Oil Centre for Rural Eye Health with an aim to provide solutions to visual impairment in rural areas of the state. An assistance of 2 crores is offered by Indian Oil Corporation to LVPEI as part of its corporate social responsibility (CSR) contribution for making the Indian Oil Centre.

The Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan said this centre will be a nodal centre for advocacy, policy planning and implementation of good quality eye health in Odisha rural areas.

IOCL and LVPEI signed a memorandum in March last year at Bhubaneswar. LVPEI provides this facility from Bhubaneswar campus which will provide the eye treatment from primary and secondary eye care centers under LVPEI community eye health.

This health program mainly aims at creating awareness on eye care among rural people to cut down the rate of blindness and visual impairment. They collected data from secondary centers and will work on it to create district level quality eye care protocols and also verify the district school screening programme and some surveys of visual impairment in a very systematic way.

Together working with state government and other eye care providers the center develops to create vision atlas in Odisha which will help in the planning of quality eye care in the state said, Mr. Pradhan.