Transforming people's lives

It is a touching scene of sibling love. Eight-year-old Fardeen is feeding Farzaan, his brother who is strapped to a wheelchair and so severely disabled that he is unable even to use his hands to eat food. This little mother to his brother helps Farzaan to a glass of water after he has eaten, and finally wipes the morsels off his cheeks. Fardeen who studies at a mainstream school has come over at lunchtime to his brother’s special school at Association of People with Disability (APD) to help him.

Lunch over, little Fardeen pushes Farzaan’s wheelchair around the play area so his brother can watch other children at play. The play area has special equipment customised for differently-abled children––B climber, jungle-jim, arch-climber, swing with special support, pyramid-climber, sand play/pit, seesaw, toy cycles and scooters, slide, etc.

Catering to many needs

The APD campus contains several such spaces catering to the needs of the disabled––for academic and occupational-skill teaching, and for play. Over the past half-century, APD has developed programmes for various disabilities, categorised into therapeutic services, education, networking and advocacy, community work, training and employment all of which have helped tens of thousands of people.

At any given point of time, APD is facilitating a positive transformation in the lives of around 20,000 people with disabilities.

All types of disability find support here––locomotor disability, speech and hearing impairment, cerebral palsy, multiple and severe disability (either congenital or a result of spinal-cord injury). This large organisation sprawling over a two-acre space began life as a tiny operation in a small garage about 51 years ago. It was founded with like-minded friends by N S Hema, herself a disabled person. When you praise her achievement, she replies modestly: “This long and successful journey has been made possible with the help of many like-minded people and also a divine power.”

The like-minded people include the staff and outsiders who give their time and money to helping the less-fortunate. The outsiders include volunteers of all ages who help out with APD work, and philanthropists who donate to various schemes or gift specific mobility aids like artificial limbs, calipers, walkers and wheelchairs. The government gives grants. Donors include individuals, corporates and NGOs.

For APD, the aim is very clear––to offer comprehensive rehabilitation to the disabled and make them integrate into the mainstream as effectively as possible. As Abhijit Mukherjee, Director, Resource Mobilisation, explains: “All our programmes are geared towards making the disabled persons self-reliant and independent and lead a life of self-esteem and dignity.”

Education and training

Many well-organised programmes for the disabled work towards this end. The first is education––APD has a school for 185 children with disability from nursery to class seven. The association also encourages early intervention because that increases the chances of progress.

Additionally, APD educates over a 1,000 children annually in urban and rural community centres across Karnataka and provides home-based education for the severely disabled who can’t be moved to a school.

There are also education programmes for parents of the differently-abled and for teachers at mainstream schools where these students are later admitted. After all, parents and teachers play vital roles in optimising the mental and physical capacities of a differently-abled child.

The second focus area is Training, Employment and Livelihood (about 2,500 people received it last year) in IT, industrial training, horticulture and industrial-training skills. This training also reaches out to the disabled at community centres (over 3,600 last year).

The horticulture units are located at Jeevan Bhima Nagar and Kyalasanahalli and train the disabled in landscaping and gardening. Most important, APD has tie-ups with private and public-sector companies, to ensure employment for those trained by them.

Then there are therapeutic services. Sha Nigar, Principal, Industrial Training Centre, took us through the physiotherapy, spinal cord and orthotic units (4,000 persons benefited last year). It was inspiring and touching to see the differently-abled including the speech-impaired engrossed in making artificial limbs and calipers for other disabled persons.

Training is also provided for therapy-providers. Finally, through networking and advocacy, APD empowers the disabled to speak for themselves and their legitimate rights at different platforms while also networking with other NGOs to fight for the rights of the differently-abled.

Beyond being a service provider

So it is clear that APD works beyond being a mere service provider to people with disability. It attempts to positively influence various stakeholders and influential factors around people with disability. It also promotes interaction among these persons. All towards creating a world without barriers and making it a more inclusive place for the differently-abled.

In spite of the magnitude of their work, the staff say this is only a small drop in the ocean, considering that there are an estimated 50 to 60 million persons with disability in India.

For Executive Director V S Basavaraju, who has been working here for nearly two decades, “the biggest challenge is to reach out to more and more people and enlist their co-operation and support in helping the differently-abled integrate into the mainstream.
It is a huge task, and we need to sensitise individuals, and organisations including the government to the needs and rights of the differently-abled so we can create a good quality of life for them.”