Cork doctor is moved to help India’s blind

A CARRIGALINE GP is replicating a Cork tandem bike project to help the blind in some of India’s most impoverished regions.

Dr Sean Dunphy was inspired after hearing about last year’s December Cork Person of the Year, Mark O’Donoghue.

Mr O’Donoghue had been offering people with disabilities the chance to be cycling partners on his tandem bicycles. The quirky idea evolved into Cycling For All, which now operates weekly in Blackrock, with the help of multiple tandem bike pilots.

Dr Dunphy read about the project in an article in The Echo some months ago. He has since purchased three tandem bikes to pilot the project, under the umbrella of the Crosshaven-based Street Children of India charity.

St Michael’s School for the Blind, in Ranchi, and a second school for the blind, run by the Franciscan Sisters Servants of the Cross, are both set to benefit from Dr Dunphy’s kindness.

He is also helping to retrain and re-skill a young blind widow, Bianca, who is raising her two children in an orphanage run by the Sisters of St Charles Borromeo, Bangalore.

Dr Dunphy spoke to The Echo about the heartbreaking challenges for people with disabilities in poverty-stricken parts of India.

“Bianca, who is just 30 years old, lost her sight after the birth of her second child,” Dr Dunphy said. 

“Just one year later, her husband dropped dead. If you are a widow in these parts, you are in big trouble, because there is so much superstition around tragedy. You can’t even go to your own children’s wedding, for fear it might bring them bad luck. Instead, you are left to a life of begging. There is no social welfare in India. You are either a multi-millionaire or living in extreme poverty.”

Dr Dunphy is hoping to teach Bianca health treatments that would allow her to retrain and return to the workforce.

“If she had a business, then her kids could help her with when they grow up and, hopefully, have their own livelihoods.”

He spoke of why the idea of tandem bikes appealed to him so much.

“We are very caught up with complicated solutions, when the simple ones are often the best. People initially told me I was mad bringing bikes to a blind school. However, when they learned about how it worked and the tandem bike pilots, they understood the sense of freedom this could potentially give people.”

Dr Dunphy has already reached out to Mark O’Donoghue, who has offered to travel to India and train tandem-bike pilots.