Volume 24 No. 1 | Autumn 2014
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Karunalaya Leprosy Centre in Puri, India
– helping restore dignity and hope to people with Leprosy
When the late Fr Marian Zelazek SVD started the SVD
Mission at Puri in India in 1970 he arrived to find the sick and
disabled sufferers of Leprosy living on the sides of the road,
with just a tarpaulin to cover them. Nobody would assist
them in their medical or material needs for fear of catching
the disease or being made unclean. They could not earn
a living or find food to eat. Fr Marian, shocked by what he
saw, dedicated his life to the care and rehabilitation of the
Leprosy patients of Puri.
Today, the Karunalaya Leprosy Care Centre, which was
established by Fr Marian and continues to be run by the
Divine Word Missionaries since his death six years ago, is a
well-established and successful centre providing medical,
educational and economic activities for people with
Hansen’s Disease.
Fr Joseph Philip SVD who is Fr Marian’s successor at
Karunalaya, says while much has been achieved over the
past four decades to help the Leprosy patients, there
remains much more to do, particularly in the area of
economic initiatives.
Fr Joseph says there is a need to build new housing too, as
the initial buildings are beginning to become very run-down.
“In 1975, Fr Marian started with rehabilitation of the sick
and the handicapped victims of Leprosy by building them
houses to live in,” Fr Joseph says.
“That was the first thing Fr Marian did in Puri, as he found
them living on the roads with just a tarpaulin for a roof.
“He acquired land for them and made a society for them.
There are 71 families in this plot of land for whom Fr Marian
made houses. Twenty-five years back, no-one would enter
this village and it was a big challenge constructing these
houses in the colony. He organised the patients to make
hollow blocks with cement and sand and with fly ash. Puri is
a sandy area and so it is not possible to make kiln bricks.
“Thus the houses that were made with these hollow
blocks are in need of total reconstruction as they are in a
dilapidated condition.”
After arriving in Puri, Fr Marian began meeting secretly with
many patients of Hansen’s Disease because revealing his
visits would have resulted in other villagers ostracising them
from the community.
In 1975, the District Magistrate and Collector of Puri asked Fr
Marian to take care of the Leprosy patients’ medical needs.
So in addition to the housing project, Fr Marian started a
small dispensary for the purpose of treating people. The
dispensary was later made into a 20 bed short stay home
with medical facilities where patients could be admitted
and treated for the ulcers caused by Leprosy, or any other
general illness.
“The short stay home is now catering to the needs of the
patients from Puri as well as a number of neighbouring
districts in the state of Odisha and even from the
neighbouring state of Andhra Pradesh,” Fr Joseph says.
Not content with housing and medical facilities, Fr Marian
turned his mind to the education of children of Leprosy
patients.
“No other children would go to the school in those days
due to the social stigma of Hansen’s Disease,” Fr Joseph
says. “Not only were the patients ostracised, but their
children were also made to pay for it.
“Today, The Beatrix School has a good name in the town
