In the teeming Indian city of Calcutta, providing health care for the city's slumdwellers has never been a high priority. But in 1980 a new initiative set out to challenge the status quo - by opening a clinic for the poor on the city's pavements. An inspiring documentary shows the Calcutta Rescue Organisation was first started, and investigates the recipe for its success.
Narrated by British actor Sir Derek Jacobi, Making A Difference: A Portrait Of The Calcutta Rescue Organisation was produced and directed by Andrew Hindle, a nurse from the UK, who himself volunteered to go and help in the Calcutta streets. His film documents the work of the resourceful voluntary organisation - in a city where poverty and sickness are locked into an incestuous embrace, and the city's populations is still rising.
The Calcutta Rescue Organisation began on Middleton Road in 1980 - founded by the determined figure of Dr Jack Preger. After responding to an appeal in his native Ireland, Pregar had previously worked in refugee camps in Bangladesh. He arrived in India in 1979 and first established a base at Middleton Road. "Slowly a clinic started," he remembers, "and without my wish, on the pavement at Middleton Road, because poor people, destitute and on the streets knew that we were making up perscriptions and came for treatment themselves."Today Calcutta Rescue runs a series of specialised clinics and welfare projects, staffed by 130 locally employed staff and many Western volenteers. Far from just dealing with emergency treatment, the Rescue has developed so that it now embraces preventative medicine and health education in the slums. It also provides skills training so that the poor can take their step on the ladder towards self-sufficiency. At one stage, Calcutta Rescue began to notice that nearly all of the children that came for treatment at the clinics were illiterate. Their response was to set up two schools where the children receive simple meals and clothes as well as having their health monitored.
Naturally there were obstacles along the way. Premises were hard to come, and fundraising was handicapped by restrictions on foreign money coming into the country. Obtaining entry visas for volunteer nurses has also been problematic. With the Indian government only issuing tourist visas - volunteers can only stay with Calcutta Rescue for limited periods of time.
But despite the difficulties, Calcutta Rescue has continued to grow. "I must say that over the years there's been quite a change in that a lot more of our patients now come from rural areas of West Bengal," says Dr. Jack. This has led to the establishment of travelling clinics visiting villages to provide health care and education. In Calcutta itself, woman from rural India can attend health education courses in the organization's premises. If the women do well, they earn a certificate, and can educate their own communities when they get home.
Making A Difference: A Portrait Of The Calcutta Rescue Organisation., looks at many of the projects, interviewing people whose lives they have changed, as well as workers and volunteers who describe the practicalities of their work. In spite of both financial and practical difficulties, the organization is making plans for the future and Dr. Jack has ambitions to expand its remit. Calcutta Rescue realises that developing a community's health and well-being is not just about running more clinics and distributing more drugs - "There's such a need for education for all these children" explains Dr. Jack - and so it should be no surprise that this visionary medical charity's next project will be to build them a third school.