Doc fights malnutrition with green fingers

When he is not attending to patients, Dr V Soundarrajan, the head of a primary health centre in Seruvaviduthi village near Peravurani in Thanjavur district, would be seen clearing the ground, sowing seeds or watering plants in the kitchen garden of the health centre. On Tuesdays, he harvests the vegetables and greens, which are cooked to feed pregnant women visiting the hospital. It has been six months since Soundarrajan started the initiative at the health centre, in a bid to bring down maternal and infant mortality rate and check anemia in pregnant women.
The initiative started in 2006 when Soundarrajan, an MBBS and specialist in diabetic medicine, decided to provide a nutritious lunch to expecting mothers, who came to the hospital for check-up on Tuesdays. "Every Tuesday around 50 pregnant women visit the primary health centre. Most of them come from poor families and are anaemic. They have no knowledge of good food habits due illiteracy — a main reason behind maternity and infant mortality. So, instead of preaching them, I decided to give them the required healthy food," says Soundarrajan, 54, who has been working in the hospital since 1992. He was helped in his endeavours by sponsors, who made donations for the weekly lunch.

It was six months ago that Soundarrajan decided to raise organic vegetables on the one-and-half an acre patch of vacant land on the premises of the health centre, to ensure better nutrition for his patients. Every week Soundarrajan harvests around 20kg of vegetables and greens including snake gourd, okra, pumpkin and cluster beans from the garden. The produce feeds around 50 pregnant women every week. The excess vegetables are distributed among women, who are also given dates, boiled pulses and fruits.

Every week the expecting mothers are taken to the garden where Soundarrajan explains them about the nutritional value of various vegetables.

Upon seeing Sundarrajan’s initiative, the state government provided him monetary assistance to execute various works. The physician with the help of friends and donors has also introduced new facilities at the centre. All these efforts have earned the health centre an ISO 9001 certification. One of them has been the construction of a children’s park on hospital premises, which was built at an expense of `3.5 lakh, for children of patients who are often left unattended.

Despite being an allopathic doctor, Soundarrajan says he employs home remedies to cultivate various herbal plants at the centre. "I come from a rural background. So, I am trying to do something for my own kind. I could do all these things only with the support of my colleagues," he adds.