Two Parsi doctors were among the 20 chosen for The International Hero of Indian Ophthalmology award, Dr Cyres Mehta from Bombay and Dr Rushad Shroff of Delhi. The awards were presented at the platinum jubilee conference of the All India Ophthalmologists Society held in Jaipur from February 16 to 19, 2017 in an auditorium packed with eye surgeons from 15 countries.
Opthalmologists Drs Cyrus Mehta (left) and Rushad Shroff
This is the first time that the award has been instituted, and "out of 20,000 eye surgeons of India only 20 were chosen… These are ambassadors of India and have won international awards for the country,” states an email received from Cyres, son of Dr Keiki Mehta, who notes that he has lectured in over 100 international conferences in 20 countries and was the first Indian to be chosen editor of the magazine of the European Society of Cataract and Refractive surgeons, said to be the most widely read magazine on ophthalmology. Over the years, Cyres has received many honors in the field and was recently elected as scientific chairman of the International Society of Cataract Surgeons, London.
Rushad, son of Dr Cyrus Shroff, is a fourth generation ophthalmologist in the family which founded the century old Shroff Eye Centre and Dr Shroff’s Charity Eye Hospital in Delhi. After completing his MBBS from Kasturba Medical College, Manipal in 2010, he pursued postgraduate training from the Regional Institute of Ophthalmology in Trivandrum and his fellowship in cataract, refractive, cornea and optics from Narayana Nethralaya, Bangalore in 2017. He has to his credit 10 publications in international journals, and has been invited as guest editor for BioMed Research International journal’s special issue on ocular immunology, innervation and vascularization, notes his bio data.