Here is the tale of a government scheme that has gone right to warm the cockles of your heart: Harish, a nine-year-old boy, is a special child.

Son of carpenter with meagre income, he lives in a small house in a slum of Hoskote. His teacher Bharathi visits him at home twice a week and spends 3 hours a day with him.

The principal of the nearby government school ensures that someone delivers mid-day meals to him at his residence. He also checks at the beginning of the academic year whether the boy has got free books and a set of school uniform.

Harish is not the only special child to get this facility. As a matter of fact, the number of special children in Hoskote is 87 and in Karnataka the figure is around 10,600.

Last year when the Education Department conducted a survey of children who were not going to school in Hoskote Taluk, they were shocked to learn that nearly 520 children had never been to school.

Teachers of Sarva Shikshana Abhiyan (SSA) were sent to conduct a door-to-door survey and get information about such children.

The survey result presented a grim picture - 84 children in the taluk were visually impaired, 45 were hearing impaired, 103 were speech impaired, 61 children were severely disabled and 140 were mentally challenged.

While these children could have been brought to school, not 87 others who were suffering from multiple-impairment and confined to bed. They were not only mentally retarded but also severely physically handicapped.

As children up to 14 years of age, including the disabled and mentally retarded, are to be given education mandatorily under SSA, these 87 children were enrolled in nearby government school and extended benefits of the home-based school scheme.

Under this project, unemployed volunteers, who have passed SSLC are roped in. Each of these volunteers have the responsibility to take care of a maximum of three children and they are paid Rs 250 for each child.

The teachers have to spend six hours a week with them to impart basic trainings so as to minimise their dependence on others as much as possible.

Though these children are a part of the nearby government school, they appear before their ‘classmates’ only on special occasions like annual day, Republic Day and Independence Day. The school ensures that they participate in these special events.

Harish’s mother, her eyes brimming with tears of gratitude to his teacher Bharathi, said “My son was not only mentally retarded but also physically handicapped. He wasn’t able to walk. Bharathi took him to Tirupati where he underwent an operation,” says the woman. With smile on her face, she says, “I too can say proudly now that my only child has the ability to stand on his legs.”

Though taking to Tirupati wasn’t Bharathi’s job, she volunteered and stayed there until the operation was performed successfully. Bharathi says there were several other opportunities to earn more money, but they would not give her job satisfaction. “For me money is secondary. Serving these disabled children gives me a great relief and satisfaction,” says Bharathi.

Harish in one respect is quite fortunate. Though he is severely disabled, his financially poor parents are with him. Another student of Bharathi, 12-year-old Supriya, is not so fortunate. She was normal up to the age of four. One day she fell while running. Thereafter she started getting fits which hampered her mental growth.

As the girl proved a burden her father eloped with another woman, leaving Supriya and her mother in the lurch. Denied paternal care, the government has taken the responsibility of the child. She is now being pampered with a ‘visiting teacher’ and free meals are delivered at her doorstep.

HOME SCHOOL

Sarva Shikshana Abhiyan Project Director L K Ateek says nearly 10,600 children have the benefit of home-based school, a scheme under the SSA to ensure 100 per cent literacy and basic education for children below 14 years of age.

“This is basically a Central Government project with 50 per cent partnership of State Government. There are guidelines from Central Government to  cover even severely mentally handicapped children under the SSA. The state made a policy to reach out to such children in a way that their dependence on society can be reduced,” says Mr Ateek.