St. Helena visit set for Indias Dr. Martin

St. Helena Star

Dr. Kiran Martin of India, who has been compared to the late Mother Teresa for her legendary humanitarian work in New Delhi, will make what has become an annual fundraising visit to St. Helena beginning Sept. 17.

A reception at Alpha Omega Winery, 1155 Mee Lane off Highway 29, on Saturday, Sept. 20 will be the highlight of Martin's visit. The event, sponsored by her host, City Councilman and Alpha Omega owner Eric Sklar, is named ASHA Day.

ASHA, which in India means “hope,” is an organization founded by Martin. Through the assistance of a great number of volunteers and about 20 paid doctors, Martin's organization has been able to extend its outreach to 300,000 people. That number represents about 10 percent of the total number of people living in the slums of the New Delhi area, according to Kailash C. Chaudhary, owner of a Napa engineering firm and another sponsor of Martin's visits to the St. Helena Area.

As a main city in a country with a population of 1.1 billion, New Delhi's overall population is 14 million â€" meaning that 25 percent of the people there live in slums.

Since graduating from medical school as a pediatrician, Martin has sought to improve the health of children and to create programs that teach adults in the slums to help themselves.

“She does not have a dole-out program,” said Chaudhary. “She is empowering people. She teaches ladies in the slums to be midwives so that they can help other ladies with children, or â€" instead of begging on the streets â€" to have their own little cottage industries, making Christmas cards, scarves and things like that.”

Internationally, the bulk of the assistance for Martin's work has come from the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia, Chaudhary said. The U.S. has assisted to a lesser degree. But Martin has found a friend in the Napa Valley, which has hosted visits for fundraising purposes since 2000. Martin's work was brought to light by Janet Thompson, wife of District 1 Congressman Mike Thompson, who discovered her work during an official visit in 1998.

Through her visits to the Napa Valley, Martin has raised more than a quarter-million dollars, according to Chaudhary. Using those funds to develop corporate challenge grants, she has parlayed the $250,000 into $5 million that has supported the work of ASHA, he said.

Martin will speak to the St. Helena Kiwanis two days prior to the ASHA Day reception on Sept. 18. Some funds raised during the ASHA event will be from a silent auction. Deadline for reserving space for ASHA Day is Sept. 5.

Information on how donations can be made to the ASHA silent auction can be obtained by calling Susan Barnett, 255-2728, ext. 101 or e-mailing susan