Neelam Gupta/Jaipur

Vimal Chopra, a chartered accountant from Jaipur, Rajasthan, is still reeling from his experience of administering the Jaipur foot in Afghanistan. ‘This experience was amazing; It was my first camp,” says Chopra, who was the leader of the camp where 75 Afghans were fitted with Jaipur foot.

Chopra clicked the video of Mir Hamza, a young Afghan who the world saw joyfully run, jump, and hop in a corridor after being fitted with a prosthetic leg in Kabul. The video went viral on social media and became a symbol of India’s human face in Afghanistan.

“Hamza defeated me in the race. Two hours ago, he came to us as a handicapped person. He could not even walk. As soon as he put on the Jaipur Foot, he started running. He challenged me to run with him. He also asked a young Afghan doctor to join him. The three of us ran, and he won the race."

An Afghan reposted this viral video of Hamza shot by Vimal Chopra on X:

An Afghan testing out his prosthetic leg! These prosthetics were delivered and installed by an Indian team

This video melted my heart! May my nation never suffer again. pic.twitter.com/MytqNoTn0t

— Obaidullah Baheer (@ObaidullaBaheer) June 30, 2025

Vimal Chopra shares his other experience, “As soon as he put on the Jaipur Foot, Eshan-Ullah Habibi ran away, brought his cycle and started going round the centre on the cycle. He could not cycle because one of his legs was amputated.”

Cycling was his dream. Tears welled up in the eyes of 24-year-old Habibi.

Shedding tears of joy, he told the Indians, 'Now I will go out of the house and work. I will also get married.”

Eshan-Ullah Habibi lost one of his legs in a blast while serving in the Afghan army. “I lost one of my legs in the bombing. Since then, I have stayed at home. My parents passed away, leaving me alone. I was not able to bear the burden of a handicapped life. I was disappointed. But this artificial leg has filled me with hope. Thank you. Thank you, India," he told Chopra's team.

Hamza, and Habibi, are among 75 Afghans who received the life-changing gift of Jaipur foot last month. The camp of Shri Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang Sahayata Samiti, Jaipur, sponsored by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), held in Kabul from June 12-25, 2025, filled them with hope.

Jaipur Foot was developed in 1970. Its inventor, D R Mehta, a former Civil servant, set up the Shri Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang Sahayata Samiti in 1975 and took the foot all over the world to help handicapped people stand on their feet.

An Afghan man showing his Jaipur Foot

"Jaipur is especially known among the people in most of the conflict-ridden areas for the unique artificial Jaipur Foot made there. This foot has changed the lives of people who have been crippled by landmines."

Since then, the committee has helped more than 24 lakh people with prosthetic legs, including 48,000 people abroad, especially in war-torn and conflict-ridden countries.

According to Dr. Mehta, outside India, he prefers to go to conflict areas where people are in dire need of the Jaipur foot. "In such areas, people are immersed in extreme despair and poverty. Jaipur Foot not only fills their hopeless life with hope, but it also gives them a chance to live with dignity. Besides, as they start working, they also get rid of poverty."

Mehta says, “We were in Palestine just three months before the war with Israel started. We fitted feet for 473 people there."

Dr.  D R Mehta, Founder and chairman of BMVSS (Jaipur Foot)

The organisation also organised Jaipur Foot camps in Pakistan in 2007 and 2018 in Karachi and Islamabad, respectively. "Pakistanis give us a lot of respect and love. Shopkeepers refused to accept money from us as they said, 'We cannot pay the price for what you are doing for us."

“This is our sixth camp in Afghanistan. The first camp was set up in 1996. Four of these camps were sponsored by the Indian government. One was set up by Dubai's Al-Falah Bank, and one by a businessman from Kabul.

Giving information about this by tweeting, the spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs of India, Randhir Jaiswal, had said that 'As part of the humanitarian aid program for the people of Afghanistan being run by the Government of India, a five-day Jaipur Foot Camp was organized in Kabul by Bhagwan Mahavir Viklang Sahayata Samiti (BMVSS), Jaipur. People participated in it with great enthusiasm. Jaipur Foot (75 45000 camp) was applied to 75 people.

It may be mentioned that India has not yet recognized the Taliban government of Afghanistan, but has continued its humanitarian aid to the people there.

Vimal Chopra told Awaz-the Voice that they set up the office in the Indian Embassy in Kabul. “We were kept under tight security in another building on the embassy premises. “

There is a 400-bed hospital near the embassy. This too was built by India. This hospital also has a department for fitting artificial limbs. However, it can just make one foot in a day. Also, that foot is not as good as the one from Jaipur.

An Indian technicina helping an Afghan with his Jaipur Foot

Vimal said, "We asked the staff of the department to join our teams and also trained them in making the Jaipur Foot."

The disabled were registered at the hospital. At the embassy camp office,  the team examined each person and took measurements. Each Jaipur foot was customised and ready in a day.

For the team's technician manager, Om Sharma, it was yet another visit to Afghanistan.

He says, “This time we had to work under extremely tight security. We flew to Kabul on an Afghan Airways flight on a Wednesday and returned on the next. All these days, we've moved in bulletproof vehicles.”

"We had to wear bulletproof jackets during the day, and at night we had to sleep with them near our pillows. There was strict security and vigilance inside and outside the embassy and the hospital. The behaviour of the people was warm. Although we are used to working in different environments, the attitude of Afghans helped lessen our fears. We were not allowed to keep a phone. There was also a problem of language, and we managed with body and sign language.”

Jaipur foot being customised at the Indian embassy in Kabul

The team fitted both legs of two young boys. “One leg of a young man was about a foot shorter than the other leg. It was amputated. But his leg was intact. The problem before us was that to make him walk, both legs had to be kept on the ground. The strength of the natural leg will also have to be increased. First, the natural leg was placed in the Jaipur Foot, and then another foot equal to the length of the other leg was made and attached to it.

"We were happy to see it for him. We used different types of materials for this. We had to see that the artificial leg was light, could be easily lifted after being placed on the ground, and the natural leg could also work fully."

Om Sharma turns emotional while speaking of his experience. “When he was able to walk normally after placing both his feet on the ground, he started jumping and shouting Hindustan Zindabad. The whole atmosphere was filled with happiness, and our faces also lit up with pride and joy.”

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According to the committee's media manager and senior journalist Prakash Bhandari, this camp was discussed a lot on Pakistan TV. The Pakistanis compared Afghan-India relations with their equation with their neighbour.