Standard Chartered Private Bank has extended its philanthropic activities to India with the launch of the five-year Kolkata Urban Comprehensive Eye Care Project.

The programme is part of the bank's "Seeing Is Believing" initiative, which works to prevent avoidable blindness in various parts of the world. The project in Kolkata will be implemented by Sightsavers, an international charity that supports the endeavour and promotes equality of opportunity for disabled people in the developing world, along with local partners and the Kolkata Municipal Corporation.

The goal of the project is to assist at least 5 million individuals in the city's urban slums over five years to 2015, with a focus on cataract and refractive errors - the key cause of blindness in the country. The Seeing Is Believing initiative was launched globally seven years ago and has since raised $25 million for eye care assistance. Philanthropy is a generally viewed as a critical service component that clients seek when partnering with private banks.

"We believe that with wealth comes responsibility, and this initiative is part of the Private Bank’s aim to involve our clients, through active philanthropy, in education and voluntary programmes developed by the Private Bank with a number of partner charities and community initiatives," Jacqui Brabazon, global head of marketing and philanthropy for Standard Chartered, said in a statement.

The KUCECP is part of SiB’s latest commitment to raise a collective target of $20 million by 2014 to provide eye care services for 20 million people in underprivileged areas.