Jack Preger

Jack Preger (born 25 July 1930, in Manchester, England) is a British doctor who has been offering medical treatment as well as vocational training to the poor in the Indian city of Kolkata and in other parts of West Bengal since 1972. He established the relief agency Calcutta Rescue.

Preger graduated from St Edmund Hall, Oxford with a post-graduate degree in economics and political science. He worked for a few years as a farmer in Wales before selling his farm and deciding to become a doctor instead. In 1965, he was admitted into the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin at the age of 35.

Work in Bangladesh

In 1972, when he had just finished his internship, although his plans had been to dedicate his life to the poor in South or Central America, and he had prepared himself by learning Spanish, he answered a call over the radio for doctors to help the people of then newly independent Bangladesh. He was soon in Dhaka, where he worked, under squalid conditions, in refugee camps filled with Urdu-speaking people who intended to return to Pakistan. He learnt Urdu and later Bengali. In 1975, he set up a 90-bed clinic in Dhaka and two farms on the outskirts of the city.

However, his work in Dhaka came to an abrupt end when he discovered that Dutch non-government organisation Terre des Hommes was operating a child-smuggling racket, and exposed it despite the Bangladesh government warning him not to. He was deported to Bangkok in 1979.

Preger thought that he would be able to do more if he operated independently, and started a clinic for the poor below the flyover connecting the Howrah Bridge. Support groups for the work of Preger have been formed in several countries, mostly spurred on by tourists returning home, who had witnessed his selfless work : England, Switzerland, France, Germany, Norway, The Netherlands, Canada, the US.

Intervention by the government

In 1980, the Foreigners' Registration Office (FRO) of the West Bengal government noted that Preger had accepted a donation from a missionary organisation based in the United States, and demanded that he declare himself as a missionary worker, in addition to being a doctor. He resolved this only after explaining to New Delhi officials that he was not a missionary worker. (Calcutta Rescue is entirely secular), and was permitted to stay in Kolkata without a visa. In 1981, the FRO charged him with entering India without a missionary visa, but he was released on bail. The FRO dropped the charge in 1989 after intervention by the then high commissioner of New Zealand to India, Sir Edmund Hillary.

After Preger registered Calcutta Rescue as a charity in 1991, he started two more clinics in Kolkata and donations came in from eight European countries. He also obtained a resident's permit.

Awards

In 1993, Preger was named a Member of the Order of the British Empire for his "continued perseverance and incredible selflessness". "