The method, we experience commonly with the setting of powered glasses is through a trial and error method which ophthalmologists use. There a patient repeatedly is asked, if he sees better than when using an earlier pair of glasses. This always confuses the patient who finds it hard to distinguish between glasses having a slight difference in power. But the device Swapan designed and named the ‘Eye Testing Meter’, where patients need not change glasses but instead go through a change in power in a scaled manner makes it a lot simpler to determine at what actual point of the scale they can see best. It is akin to a movie that slowly comes into focus. To put it in simpler terms, an object seen through this machine appears from a blur to clarity and at that point of clarity, the patient signals the operator who can then recorded the power needed by the patient.

Mr. Kar replaced the fixed glass lenses by a single variable lense. He varies the power of the lense by using water. The same can be either concave or convex. The mechanism is simple, he takes a transparent membrane which is elastical in nature. He uses a condom for this which he fixes at one end of a pipe. The other end is then closed by a piece of plain glass. Now the chamber is filled with clear liquid, Swapan uses distilled water for this. The amount of water is increased through the use of a syringe and the membrane expands outwards turning it into a concave lense while it turns convex as the quantity of water gets reduced. The membrane and the clear liquid represent the characteristics of the lense. To pump in or suck out water, the machine is attached to a 3 volt motor and nozzle and a simple syringe. The patient then checks his sight by looking through the plain glass-end.

Comparing Mr. Kar’s invention to the computerised method of calculating eye-power, a senior eye-surgeon, Indrajit Sinha says, “Computers can give you a range only. Again you need to fix it by trial and error method. But this idea surpasses the present method.”

He stated that this machine is a time saver and has the scope to be used widely in medical-camps, organised especially in rural areas, where one doctor needs to check a huge number of patients in a pre-fixed time frame.

The tool is effective for deeming power for short sight, long sight or mixed problems. As costlier components are not used in making it, it can be produced at a low-cost, thus it proves to be very helpful, especially to the poor.

In spite of all the potential, this machine is still not in use, no company or government or NGO organisation has stepped forward to adopt it and the set Mr. Kar made is resting at the foot-rest of the inventor’s computer desk after it was patented in late 2007 in India.

Swapan Bikash Kar is based in Tripura’s capital Agartala and serves the Water Resource Department. After he secured the recognition from the Patent authority, he approached different companies. Most of them did not respond to this call, and even those which did reply did not pursue the matter even after applauding his efforts.

He said, “I went to a Chennai based company that makes ophthalmologic-equipment. They took a brief look at it, praised it and the discussion lasted for over a couple of months. But when it came to the settlement on the financial part of the agreement with me, they trailed”.

“A USA based company was interested but I was not sure that if they marketed it, whether, it would be available in India at a low-cost. So that venture was ruined. However, these are all stories of failed attempts as nothing has come of it till date,” sighs Mr. Kar adding that he is completely frustrated which restricts him from developing the machine further like adding an electronic meter to record the diagnosed power instead of the manual jotting down from a mechanically moved iron-wire.

He pointed out that some of the established doctors have also enquired about the machine and have suggested the voluntary commissioning of the device in clinics but that also requires a full-fledged operator and the cost for this can not be borne out of what he earns.

Mr. Kar still hopes that with the availability of funds, he will leave his On-the-Clock-Job to become a fulltime researcher and his next project will be on house-hold-power-generation from ‘so-called unlikely stuff’.

Dipankar Sen Gupta