Most of the women were poor, overworked, and overburdened by the routine of life, such as looking after animals and bringing up their children. These women had little or no local medical aid available, and whatever medical aid was available in the city, was very expensive for them to avail of. Due to these miserable conditions prevalent for the average woman in the villages, especially those of low caste, Mr. Khullar's made up his mind to do something positive for them. It was only in 1993 that he finally took a plunge to start a small medical centre in a small room donated by one of the villagers Mr. Shri Chand for use as a medical centre in village Mitrol, Tehsil Palwal, Dist. Faridabad in the state of Haryana, India on December 01, 1993. A few village elders were called on the day of the opening ceremony with the distribution of simple sweets to all in the small room of size 12 feet by 15 feet. Such was the beginning of ABLE Charities (ABLE is an acronym for "Association of Blindness and Leprosy Eradication" - but with the expanded scope of the organization, the full form is a misnomer).

As there was no diagnostic aid with us whatsoever, the doctor had to route these patients to the town of Palwal, 15 Kms.  away, which the poor patients resented due to their financial situation. It was decided to add a bit of laboratory equipment.  An offer to collect a donation of Rs.10,000/- was made in mid-1994 and a small lab with a small microscope was started on July 15th 1994 with lot of fanfare. Mr. Sanjay Sharma, an ordinary student from the village assisting the doctor, was trained by Dr. Tiwari as a lab assistant draw the blood  from the patients and do such lab tests as TLC, DLC, HB, Pregnancy test and so on. Our one room hospital had started thriving.

In the same period, Venue Eye Hospital from Delhi approached us to  avail their services of an eye specialist once a week, so that the eyes of the patients in the village could be checked and the necessary medicines prescribed or if required, patients could be taken for operation to Delhi at their modern eye hospital. This was a boon which was accept accepted gladly and ABLE hospital was now able to help villagers who had eye ailments. So equipment for testing eyes was bought from Delhi and installed in one corner of the same one room hospital! In one corner sat our medical specialist Dr. Tiwari, in the second corner the eye specialist was using the space, in the third corner the lab was operating, and in the fourth corner, Mr. Sanjay Sharma was registering the patients, and distributing medicines and collecting Rs.10/- from each patient. It was a great feeling of success when everyday during the summer months, over 60-70 patients would to flock in temperatures touching between 110-120 degrees Fahrenheit, all congregating in the small room and some sitting under the trees. It could make a great story for some journalist to write, because Mr. P. K. Khullar used to talk and find out about the daily life and problems of these simple rural men and women so as to improve our services.

Due to shortage of funds and equipment and lack of an X-Ray machine which was needed immediately, the cases of Tuberculosis (TB) became unmanageable, and we started looking for some donor who could donate an X-Ray machine. This donor came in the form of Mr. Vinod Kumar (Vinny) Relan. He telephoned to say that he had come to know of our pressing need and was ready to help with the necessary money. He gave a cheque of Rs.75,000/-, full amount for a 60 MA X-Ray machine and this machine was installed in a covered verandah, 5’ x 18’, in the same building. A small enclosure 3' X 3' in one corner of the verandah was converted into a dark room where the films were developed by Mr. Sanjay Sharma. Whenever some important X-Ray was required to be taken, it was so done by Dr. Tiwari himself, otherwise we used Mr. Sanjay Sharma's services, who was now our medical assistant, dispenser of medicines, lab assistant, and purchase manager for the medicines from Delhi!

"One man's Army to deal with all problems under the “generalship” of Dr. Surendra Tiwari."

The X-Ray could not work without electricity in the rural area, one commodity which could not be depended upon given the frequency of power cuts, hence there was an urgent need of a standby generator. Mrs. Veena  Malhotra (sister of Mr. P.K. Khullar) came as an angel from the U.K. She donated the full amount for the purchase of a small generator which worked for  us for nearly 9 years.
 
Since 65% of the patients were women and given their conservative nature, there was a tremendous pressure on us to have a lady doctor a (gynecologist)  even if she was available only once or twice a week. We advertised and got Dr. Ahmed at the princely remuneration of Rs.10,000/- per month. It was a big amount for ABLE, but the need and desire to have a lady doctor was bigger. The news of the availability of a qualified senior lady doctor spread like wild fire and our roll call multiplied. The small store 5’ x 10’ room made for our hospital was converted as her chamber, and we had a ladies’ department in that multi-faceted and multi-polar hospital with just one basic room to operate from.
 
As luck was on our side, and God was kind, donations kept pouring in from within India and from abroad and we kept on running and maintaining a high professional quality of services to the rural poor. Our dedication, motivation, honesty all combined to convince the villagers and other rural people that it was worth the effort to keep the ABLE hospital as a permanent fixture in the area. Many individuals and the village councils came forward as a sequel to our appeal for land to make a permanent building for the hospital. After a thorough study of various options, we accepted the offer of the village council, Bahrola, for a grant of nearly 7 acres of land situated 65 Kilometers from Delhi on National Highway No.2, on the way from Delhi to Agra, and started our tour of the world for generation of resources so that a proper building could be constructed on the donated land.
 
Mr. P. K. Khullar undertook the tour of USA, Canada and England for a period of six months. Interviews on Indian television Channels in Vancouver and Toronto, Canada were arranged by his daughter Mrs. Meenakshi Bhalla. Stories in local Indian newspapers were published. Radio talks were organized in England by Mr. Ajeet Singh. Mass talks in the temples and gurdwaras were arranged. Literally thousands of people were contacted all over.
 

Mr. Ajeet Singh, a noble man and member of Bushby Lions Club, came forward to take help from the Lions for the purchase of 2 mobile clinics so that the doctors could go to rural areas with the medicines.

Mr. M. L. Malhan from Leicester, England, took the lead and organized meetings at his home, and other places. As a result of this Herculean effort, nearly US $ 20,000/- (about Rs. One million) from the individuals and companies and a grant of US$30,000 (about Rs.15 lakhs) by Lions International was arranged. With nearly US $50,000 we could lay down the foundations for a modern hospital and two mobile clinics which proved a boon for the ailing. The application for permission to use the land for hospital, was put up in 1997 but it was only in 1999 that the same was sanctioned by the Government of Haryana, after a delay of over two and a half years.

The foundation stone for the new building was laid officially, on Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary, on October 2nd,1999. The building was expected to be COMPLETED IN SIX MONTHS but because of high water table, an extra expenditure had to be incurred on stronger foundations. Donations kept on pouring in and we could complete the first phase of our 'PROJECT HOSPITAL' with the construction of nearly 4000sft of area which we used with great care, and diligence. One of the small private wards was converted into an operation theatre, the dirty linen room was converted into a lab, the dressing room-cum lab room was converted into x-ray room and the area under the staircase was used as pharmacy. Though there was a great pressure on space, but the hospital was running, in fact, flying on the wings provided by generous donors. The response was tremendous. Surgical operations were being done by the visiting doctors. Departments of dermatology, gynecology, orthopedics, and ENT were added with the help of visiting doctors from Faridabad. Our OPD went up from about 60 to over 100 per day. The average was around 80 odd, on any working day spread over different departments.

Since we did not have adequate investigating or supporting infrastructure, an appeal was made to Lions International and to all friends and relations to support this project. About 22 relations and friends chipped in, with an amount of nearly $ 4000 each for construction of a room each in the name of their families and Lions International gave a grant of US $75,000 (about Rs. 35 Lakhs) for purchase of modern medical equipment. With the support of these funds, we were able to acquire an ultrasound machine costing over US $15,000, a bigger 500MA x-ray machine, an ultramodern patient table, with all its attendant supporting equipment such as defibrillator, overhead operations lights, diathermy, and so on. The seed of 1990 had sprouted and taken the shape of a big modern hospital with 10 functional departments, i.e. general medicine, general surgery, gynecology obstetrics, partial-radiology, dermatology, pathology, initial stages of cardiology and TMT with echo facilities, ENT, ophthalmology, and dentistry including dental surgery.

It will be pertinent to record that a great philanthropist Dr. Mani Vader, a dentist in the city of Leicester, UK, came forward to donate a complete dental department, along with the cost of the dental room and we had an ultra-modern dental equipment. received directly from England. A private company came forward and donated 5,000 toothbrushes and tooth-paste tubes, to be distributed free of cost, which was meant for improving the dental hygiene among children mainly in rural areas. Today we have 4 permanent doctors, and 10 visiting doctors with an average annual OPD attendance of nearly 30,000 patients. The number of surgical operations varying from ordinary hernia and appendicitis, to stones in the kidney, and laparoscopy and endoscopy are being done in our hospital. Nearly 500 such operations are done annually and we hope that we will double this number within the next couple of years. ABLE hospital has successfully achieved its target of medical services at an affordable cost to the patients, because our consultation fee with the hospital's medical doctor is just Rs.5/- and only Rs. 20/- for a consultant coming from outside.

Acceptance of ABLE hospital is so much that a larger number of patients having different diseases on neurological side, orthopedic side or cancer, regularly approach us for guidance and help and treatment which we are unfortunately not able to offer, for want of accommodation and funds for equipment. However, the main area where we lack  is on the pediatric side where in spite of many deliveries, patients sometimes have to be referred to pediatric specialists to the city.

SAVING THE POOR BY HEART SURGERY 

Luck brought us another area of service. On August 15, 2002, a call was received by Mr. P. K. Khullar that a young girl lay dying in the Civil Hospital Faridabad, and could ABLE do anything to help? Mr. P. K. Khullar rushed to the Civil Hospital and found a 14 year old girl Neha dying there with two defective heart valves. Authorities at Apollo Hospital Delhi also had been contacted and they came to the same place at the same time. It was decided by the cardiologist of Apollo Hospital that she needed an urgent heart operation. It was immediately decided that the girl be taken in ABLE's ambulance (driven by Mr. P. K. Khullar himself!) and moved into the emergency ward at Apollo Hospital. Very kindly, the Apollo Hospital did the operation free of cost and transported her to ABLE hospital ICU for recuperation. She was looked after and fed the requisite diet, given the essential medicines, all at a total cost of Rs.20,000/- and then sent home.

However,  since she had lost her mother earlier, and her father was a very poor vegetable vendor, unable to give her a career, it was decided by ABLE hospital to do something for her and so we approached Mr. J. N. Kaul, Chairman,  SOS villages, who, in spite of the girl being grown up, agreed to take her in, and today, Neha is looking forward to a bright career courtesy the education and care provided by the SOS Villages organization.
 
This gesture of Mr. P.K. Khullar received coverage in newspapers and many people approach ABLE hospital for providing help to poor children with defective hearts and subsequently more children were operated at Apollo Hospital and Escorts Hospital Faridabad for open heart surgeries, thus saving their lives. So we then created a new fund known as NEHA-N00R Children Heart Cure Fund.

Sarthak, son of a van driver who had to to be operated for open heart surgery  since he had a heart defect from birth. The parents could not get the boy treated because they were poor and could not afford to pay for the surgery.

Apollo doctors approached us and requested to raise funds for immediate surgery. Mr. P. K. Khullar did not get time to raise the funds and gave it from  ABLE'S funds. Surgery was performed and the boy was fine after that.

 EDUCATION

Though education is as noble a cause - if not more - than medical services, we got into this field inadvertently. Quite early in our existence we decided to give medical services to poor widows. As poor widows came to avail the medical services from us, they brought their small, innocent children mostly sick and in great need of medical advice as well some urgent medication. Slowly as we got close to this poor set of people, we realized that the children were also in great need of support in the field of education.

Hence we started giving educational grant to two children and as we went along in the years we increased our help to the children of all widows whom we were helping. So we had eight children. Plus we adopted one brilliant child of a poor worker in the village. WE supported him right through from sixth class to the twelfth class where he passed in high marks. Starting with 8 children in 1998, ABLE is now educating over 400 children. 

Dr. Vader came forward to support one child and he constantly helped us through ABLE CHARITIES of England.

Another project in the field of education i.e. the spread of education in the slums of Faridabad was supported by a very highly motivated and dedicated lady in this area Dr. Savita Datt. She was educating about 30 children when Mr. P.K. Khullar came in contact with her, and they made plans to rid illiteracy in the slums of Faridabad where, according to some estimates, live nothing less than 50,000 school going children whose parents are either careless or helpless in educating their wards. So they started two schools to begin with. They hope to have 100 schools in the slums of this city with the present attendance going from the existing 125 to 10,000.

Dreams requiring 100 schools could not be full field because the slums where the schools where running were demolished by the Govt. and it was decided to concentrate in the rural areas.