Bisakha Hela with her mother. Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya

Bisakha Hela is all of three years. Since birth, she has had breathing problems and difficulty while being breastfed. Bisakha suffers from Atrial Septal Defect, or a ?hole in the heart?. The operation to cure her condition would cost over Rs 1 lakh, something completely beyond the reach of her father, who works in a showroom and earns Rs 1,200 per month to support the family, residing in the slums of Garcha.

Fourteen-month-old Deepnayan De from Tezpur, Assam, has a similar story of heart problems and a family monthly income of Rs 5,000.

Come July, and there will be hope for Bisakha, Deepnayan and children like them, who suffer from curable heart ailments but do not have the money for treatment.

Rotary Club of Calcutta Mahanagar is undertaking a project to arrange free heart surgeries for ?at least two children per month?.

?Around 20-25 such cases are reported every month at the leading heart care centres in the city. A one-time operation can cure these kids but lack of funds prevents the families from getting it done,? said Shekhar Mehta, chairman of the endeavour, entitled Healing Little Hearts.

The surgeries typically cost between Rs 1 lakh and Rs 1.2 lakh. If untreated, the kids can develop heart complications as they grow older and their life expectancy can be reduced to 25-30 years.

Rotary has tied up with BM Birla Heart Research Centre and Rabindranath Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences for the project. ?They have agreed to subsidise the operation costs as much as they can. The rest will be borne by us,? Mehta explained.

The project was taken up at the behest of the club?s new president, cardiologist Dr R.P. Vidhawan, whose term commences from July. ?I used to come across a number of congenital heart disease cases in children, while working with SSKM and Belle Vue in my early days. I always wanted to do something about it,? Vidhawan said.

Vidhawan chanced upon Bisakha through a club member working in the slums. ?Her parents had taken her to various city hospitals but were devastated to learn the operation cost,? the doctor recalled.

A list of around 12 cases has been prepared, which covers patients from the city and the Northeast.

?We are trying to raise funds and have approached Rotary International for grants as well,? Mehta added.

Cases can be reported and contributions made by emailing skylinehouse@vsnl.net