Of all the causes of blindness, cataract is the cruel one and the kind one at once. Cruel, because it takes sight slowly from people who can often see perfectly well with a twenty-minute operation. Kind, for exactly the same reason: it is reversible. Glaucoma takes vision you cannot get back. Cataract takes vision that is waiting behind a clouded lens.
Which is why a surgical camp is a meaningful intervention at all — and why the Armed Forces Medical Services (AFMS) has been running one.
On 30 September 2026, the 11th Mega Eye Surgical Camp under Operation Drishti concluded at 92 Base Hospital, Srinagar, closing the Kashmir leg of the initiative. Across two camps the surgical team from Army Hospital (Research & Referral), under Brigadier Sanjay Kumar Mishra, performed 364 eye surgeries — cataract, glaucoma, pterygium and retinal procedures.
The screening, which is the harder half
The surgeries are the visible part. The work that made them possible happened in the preceding weeks.
Teams from 92 Base Hospital and 328 Field Hospital ran 18 screening camps across remote and forward areas of the Kashmir Valley — Tangdhar, Dawar, Machil, Uri, Baramulla, Bandipora, Khanabal and Kangan. They screened nearly 6,000 people and identified around 500 requiring surgical intervention.
Hold those two numbers together: 6,000 screened, 500 needing surgery. About one person in twelve walking into a screening camp in these areas had an eye condition requiring an operation. That is not a statement about Kashmir specifically; it is what unscreened populations look like everywhere, and it is the reason the screening is the harder and more important half of the exercise. Surgery addresses the patients you have found. Screening determines how many you find.
Of the 500 identified, 364 were operated in two phases.
Tangdhar, and an underground operating theatre
Phase one ran at Tangdhar on 24-25 September 2026, in the sector along the Line of Control, and it is the part of this story worth dwelling on. It was the first mega eye surgical camp ever conducted at the LoC, in an underground operation theatre. 220 sight-restoring surgeries were performed over two days.
Consider what that requires. Ophthalmic surgery is microsurgery: the surgeon works through an operating microscope on a structure a few millimetres across, and needs stable power, controlled lighting, a sterile field, functioning phacoemulsification equipment and a reliable supply of intraocular lenses. Doing this at altitude, in a forward sector, in a hardened underground facility — a facility that exists because the location is exposed to fire — is a logistics achievement before it is a surgical one.
Two hundred and twenty operations in two days also means roughly a hundred and ten a day. That is a high-throughput cataract camp, and such rates are achieved only with a practised assembly-line discipline: dedicated teams for counselling, dilation, anaesthesia, surgery and post-operative care, running in parallel so the surgeon's time is spent operating rather than waiting.
Phase two ran at 92 Base Hospital, Srinagar, on 28-29 September, where 144 patients were operated. Several with severely impaired vision improved significantly, some regaining clear vision the following day — which is characteristic of cataract surgery and is the reason it produces the response it does.
The Srinagar phase also delivered procedures beyond routine cataract extraction: glued intraocular lens implantation, glaucoma surgery, pterygium excision, and retinal interventions for diabetic retinopathy. Each of those is a sub-speciality procedure rather than a camp staple, and their presence is the difference between a cataract drive and an ophthalmology service.
Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Shri Manoj Sinha attended the closing ceremony, with Lt Gen Balbir Singh, General Officer Commanding, 15 Corps.
What the four conditions are
A reader should know what was actually treated, because the four conditions are different problems.
Cataract is a clouding of the lens — the transparent structure behind the iris that focuses light on the retina. Proteins in the lens aggregate with age and it becomes opaque. Treatment removes the clouded lens and implants an artificial intraocular lens (IOL) in its place. A glued IOL is a technique used when the eye lacks adequate capsular support to hold a conventional lens — the implant is fixed to the sclera with the patient's own tissue glue or fibrin. It is a more demanding operation and it extends surgery to eyes that would otherwise be inoperable.
Glaucoma is damage to the optic nerve, usually associated with raised pressure inside the eye. Crucially, the vision it destroys does not come back; surgery and medication arrest progression rather than restore sight. This is why glaucoma screening matters more than glaucoma surgery — the gain is in the vision not yet lost.
Pterygium is a benign fibrovascular growth of the conjunctiva that creeps across the cornea, associated with chronic exposure to ultraviolet light, wind and dust. It is common in high-altitude and outdoor-working populations, which is precisely the population here. Left alone it can encroach on the visual axis.
Diabetic retinopathy is damage to the retina's blood vessels caused by diabetes, and it is the condition in this list that is growing fastest. Retinal interventions arrest damage; they do not reverse it. Its appearance in a Kashmir eye camp is a marker of the epidemiological transition — the same shift towards non-communicable disease that reshapes health provision everywhere.
Medical outreach as a military task
Operation Drishti has now covered the North, West, East and Central regions of the country, with the next phase scheduled in Odisha. It is worth being clear-eyed about what this kind of operation is and is not.
It is not a substitute for a civil health system. Eleven camps cannot clear a national cataract backlog, and the AFMS exists to keep soldiers fit to fight, not to run public ophthalmology.
What it is, is a use of capability that already exists. The armed forces maintain surgical teams, field hospitals, transport and the organisational habit of deploying complex capability into difficult terrain at short notice — because that is their job. Turning that machinery towards a civilian population in a border district costs relatively little at the margin and delivers something the civil system struggles to reach, because the places hardest for a health system to serve are often precisely the places where the army is already stationed.
There is a second, less comfortable dimension, and it should be named rather than implied. Medical outreach in a sector along the Line of Control is also civic action — an activity that builds goodwill in a population whose cooperation has security value. That does not make the 364 restored sights less real, and it does not make the motive cynical. Armies have conducted civic action for as long as they have operated among civilians, and the honest description is that the humanitarian and the strategic align here rather than compete. Both things are true, and a student who understands why both are true understands the subject better than one who notices only the first.
The approach belongs to a broader pattern in which the armed forces apply organisational capacity to problems adjacent to their core task, alongside the civil institutions built for disaster risk reduction and the public critical-care infrastructure being added under PM-ABHIM — and alongside the medical and nursing establishment whose centenary the Military Nursing Service marked this same month.
🔑 Revision block
- 11th Mega Eye Surgical Camp under Operation Drishti concluded at 92 Base Hospital, Srinagar, on 30 September 2026, closing the Kashmir leg.
- 364 eye surgeries across both camps — cataract, glaucoma, pterygium and retinal procedures. Surgical team from Army Hospital (Research & Referral), led by Brigadier Sanjay Kumar Mishra.
- Screening: teams from 92 Base Hospital and 328 Field Hospital ran 18 screening camps at Tangdhar, Dawar, Machil, Uri, Baramulla, Bandipora, Khanabal and Kangan; nearly 6,000 screened, about 500 identified as needing surgery.
- Phase 1 — Tangdhar, 24-25 September 2026, in the sector along the Line of Control: the first-ever mega eye surgical camp at the LoC, in an underground operation theatre. 220 surgeries in two days.
- Phase 2 — 92 Base Hospital, Srinagar, 28-29 September 2026: 144 surgeries, including glued IOL implantation, glaucoma surgery, pterygium excision and retinal interventions for diabetic retinopathy.
- LG of J&K Shri Manoj Sinha attended the closing; Lt Gen Balbir Singh, GOC 15 Corps, present.
- Cataract: clouding of the lens; leading cause of blindness in India; reversible — lens removed and an intraocular lens (IOL) implanted. A glued IOL is fixed to the sclera where capsular support is inadequate.
- Glaucoma: damage to the optic nerve, usually with raised intraocular pressure; vision lost is not recoverable — treatment arrests progression.
- Pterygium: benign fibrovascular growth of the conjunctiva over the cornea; linked to UV light, wind and dust; common in outdoor and high-altitude populations.
- Diabetic retinopathy: damage to retinal blood vessels from diabetes; interventions arrest rather than reverse damage.
- Operation Drishti has covered the North, West, East and Central regions; next phase in Odisha.
- AFMS = Armed Forces Medical Services. Note the distinction between restoring sight (cataract) and preserving it (glaucoma, retinopathy) — the reason screening matters as much as surgery.
🎯 Practice MCQs
Q1. Cataract is best described as a: (a) Clouding of the cornea (b) Degeneration of the optic nerve (c) Clouding of the lens of the eye (d) Detachment of the retina
→ (c) Cataract is an opacification of the lens, the structure behind the iris that focuses light on the retina. Corneal clouding, optic nerve degeneration and retinal detachment are three different conditions, and all three are offered here as distractors.
Q2. In cataract surgery, the clouded lens is replaced by: (a) An intraocular lens (b) A corneal graft (c) A scleral buckle (d) A silicone oil tamponade
→ (a) An intraocular lens (IOL) is implanted. A corneal graft replaces the cornea, and scleral buckles and silicone oil are used in retinal surgery.
Q3. The key clinical difference between cataract and glaucoma is that: (a) Only cataract affects both eyes (b) Glaucoma occurs only in older patients (c) Cataract is caused by infection and glaucoma by injury (d) Vision lost to cataract can be restored, whereas vision lost to glaucoma cannot
→ (d) Cataract blindness is reversible by surgery; glaucoma destroys the optic nerve and that loss is permanent. This is why glaucoma screening is more valuable than glaucoma surgery — the benefit lies in the vision not yet lost.
Q4. Phase one of the Kashmir leg of Operation Drishti was notable because it was the first mega eye surgical camp conducted: (a) Above an altitude of 5,000 metres (b) At the Line of Control, in an underground operation theatre (c) Entirely by a team of women surgeons (d) Using robotic surgical assistance
→ (b) The Tangdhar camp of 24-25 September 2026 was the first mega eye surgical camp at the LoC, conducted in an underground operation theatre, with 220 surgeries over two days.
Q5. Pterygium is a growth of the conjunctiva over the cornea, strongly associated with chronic exposure to: (a) Industrial solvents (b) High-protein diets (c) Ultraviolet light, wind and dust (d) Low atmospheric oxygen
→ (c) Pterygium is linked to chronic UV light, wind and dust exposure, which makes it common among outdoor-working and high-altitude populations — exactly the group served by these camps.
Q6. A 'glued IOL' procedure is used when the eye: (a) Has an elevated intraocular pressure (b) Has previously undergone a corneal transplant (c) Requires a bifocal correction (d) Lacks adequate capsular support to hold a conventional intraocular lens
→ (d) Where the capsule cannot support a standard implant, a glued IOL is fixed to the sclera using the patient's own tissue adhesive. It is technically more demanding and extends surgery to eyes that would otherwise be inoperable.
Q7. In the screening phase, nearly 6,000 people were screened and about 500 identified as needing surgery. This implies that: (a) Roughly one in twelve of those screened required surgical intervention (b) The screening method had a high false-positive rate (c) Most eye disease in the area is untreatable (d) Cataract prevalence in the area is close to 50%
→ (a) About 500 of 6,000 is roughly one in twelve — a figure characteristic of previously unscreened populations, and the reason screening determines the scale of what surgery can then address.
Q8. Diabetic retinopathy involves damage to the: (a) Lens proteins (b) Blood vessels of the retina (c) Lacrimal glands (d) Extraocular muscles
→ (b) It is damage to the retinal blood vessels caused by diabetes. Interventions arrest further damage but do not restore vision already lost — placing it, like glaucoma, in the "preserve" rather than "restore" category.
Q9. The surgical team for the Kashmir camps was drawn from: (a) The All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi (b) The Armed Forces Medical College, Pune (c) Army Hospital (Research & Referral), New Delhi (d) The Military Hospital, Srinagar
→ (c) The team came from Army Hospital (Research & Referral), the Army's apex tertiary-care hospital, under Brigadier Sanjay Kumar Mishra. 92 Base Hospital and 328 Field Hospital conducted the screening and hosted the second phase.
Q10. Which of the following best describes the dual character of military medical outreach in a border sector? (a) It is purely humanitarian, with no strategic dimension (b) It replaces the civil health system in such areas (c) It is primarily a training exercise for military surgeons (d) It delivers genuine medical benefit while also functioning as civic action with security value
→ (d) Both descriptions hold simultaneously. The restored sight is real, and goodwill among a border population has security value. Here the humanitarian and strategic purposes align rather than compete — and recognising that is more accurate than asserting either one alone.
📋 How this gets asked (PYQ pattern)
This story sits at a junction that the NDA paper exploits often: biology that is genuinely examinable, and defence organisation that is cheap to learn.
The first pattern is the structure of the eye and its disorders. Cornea, lens, iris, retina, optic nerve, conjunctiva, sclera — and which condition affects which. Cataract on the lens, glaucoma on the optic nerve, pterygium on the conjunctiva, retinopathy on the retinal vessels, and refractive errors (myopia, hypermetropia, astigmatism, presbyopia) on focusing. Questions pair a condition with a structure, and the distractors are always neighbouring structures.
The second is reversible versus irreversible blindness, which is the single most useful organising idea in this topic. Cataract and refractive error are correctable; glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy and advanced macular degeneration are not. The policy consequence — that cataract surgery clears a backlog while glaucoma requires screening — follows directly, and questions increasingly test the reasoning rather than the list.
The third is AFMS organisation: the Armed Forces Medical Services as the tri-service medical organisation, the DGAFMS, the Armed Forces Medical College at Pune, Army Hospital (Research & Referral) as the apex referral hospital, base hospitals and field hospitals and the difference between them. A question naming an institution and asking its role is standard.
A fourth pattern is named operations of a non-combat kind. Operation Drishti for eye care, Operation Sadbhavana in Jammu and Kashmir, and the various humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations. Examiners like these because they are unambiguous, and because they test whether a candidate understands that armed forces conduct tasks other than warfighting.
Preparing for NDA? In the biology of the eye, sort every condition into "restorable" or "preservable" before memorising anything else. That single distinction organises the whole topic and answers most of what is asked. Build the base with our NDA general ability notes, follow the daily NDA current affairs, and prepare with our faculty in the upcoming Cavalier courses in Delhi.
✍️ Written by Maj Sunil Chopra — Co-founder and defence studies faculty at The Cavalier. Reviewed by the Cavalier Faculty Desk.