K. Bhujang Shetty

Katkeri Bhujang Shetty (21 October 1953 – 19 May 2023) was an Indian ophthalmologist and the founder-chairman of Narayana Nethralaya, a super-speciality eye care hospital in Bengaluru, Karnataka. He attended Baldwin Boys' High School in Bengaluru, where he was school captain and sports captain.

Career After completing his postgraduate training in 1982, Shetty established a small ophthalmology clinic in Srirampuram, Bengaluru.

In December 2022, a free eye hospital named Narayana Devalaya was inaugurated in Tumakuru under the Narayana Nethralaya umbrella.

Eye donation advocacy Shetty promoted eye donation in Karnataka. He enlisted the support of Kannada film actor Rajkumar, who pledged to donate his eyes, leading to the establishment of the Dr. Rajkumar Eye Bank at Narayana Nethralaya in 1994. The programme used trained technicians and wide-field digital imaging to screen premature infants for retinopathy of prematurity across rural neonatal units in Karnataka.

Peer-reviewed research published in the Indian Journal of Ophthalmology and Seminars in Fetal and Neonatal Medicine, on which Shetty was listed as a co-author, documented the programme's operation across multiple zones and over 80 neonatal units in Karnataka. The Indian Journal of Ophthalmology in memoriam stated the programme had screened more than 80,000 infants by 2023.

Death Shetty died on 19 May 2023 in Bengaluru from cardiac arrest at the age of 69. He had returned home after seeing patients when he suffered the cardiac arrest and was admitted to Manipal Hospital, Yeshwanthpur, where he was declared dead at approximately 9:40 pm.