We had devastating rains and floods in July 2005 in Gujarat. Some Doctors & Social workers happened to visit micro interior villages of Mahudha and Nadiad taluka of Kheda District to provide food grains and medical treatment. There they found the situation mind boggling and pathetic. They saw thousands of poor illiterate villagers suffering from skin diseases, respiratory, gastrointestinal and infectious diseases in pathetic-helpless situations. Government machinery was doing level best to provide financial aid, improving infrastructure facilities like roads, electricity, food supply; establishing communication with remote areas etc. But, it was practically impossible for them to meet health needs of millions of villagers. Primary Health Services seemed to be a herculean task, since it required over and above medicinal supply, help by Qualified Health Professionals-Doctors.
As a result of this visit, 3 doctors and 8 workers with a strong intuition set together and coined a team to take up the task under name of Sanjivani Health and Relief Committee (SHRC). More and more weekly camps were arranged every Sunday. In a short span of 3 months their strength rose from 3 to 10 Doctors and from 8 to 16 workers. They catered free medical treatment to over 10,000 patients. Just visiting a village to provide medical aid once wasn't enough. So Sanjivani started follow-up camps in these villages in prescheduled manner in consultation with health and revenue authorities of the district.
This small initiative, eventually gathered a momentum and today Sanjivani is proud to be a NGO with- 20 senior qualified medical practitioners, 3 Eye surgeons, 10 dental surgeons, 30 ophthalmic assistants, lab technicians and more than 50 dedicated volunteers providing medical services and free medicines to poor villagers at their doorsteps.