Hearing impairment no hurdle to achieve success

Shashwath is the son of Pundalika Kini and Prafulla Kini. He has been suffering from hearing impairment since his birth.

He has scored 118 in Kannada, 65 in Mathematics, 93 in Science, 82 in Social Studies with a total of 358. He had exemption for language exams. “We had sought exemption for languages in SSLC to get admission for PUC. In all the three preparatory examinations, he had scored good marks in English and Hindi. If we had not taken the exemption for the second and third language, he would have scored more marks,” says proud father Pundalik Kini.

Kini who has served in BSF, resigned in 1995 to take care of his child. His mother is employed at Women and Child Welfare department.

Hardships

Shashwath had to travel for 12 km daily to reach the school. He wants to pursue his education in commerce stream at Ganapathy PU College. If the PU Board also gives exemption for languages, then he can pusue his education, says his father.

Shashwath is also a good artist. Dejected over the interrupted power cuts, he has placed a wind mill on the top of his house. However, it is yet to be connected with a machine to get the power.

Kini says: “We realised the defect when he was one year eight month old. He was not responding to any sound. Dr Jayashri Bhat of KMC suggested us to give him training in speech and started using hearing machine. When he was two years old, he was admitted to Mangalajyothi Integrated School, Vamanjoor. It was Asha Teacher of Canara School, who gave him full support during his early days in school. When he was in fourth standard, his hearing machine got spoiled, which had to be imported from Germany with the help of donors in Mangalore. After the hearing machine spoiled, he expressed his desire to continue to study by looking at the lip movement, which we encouraged,” he said.

Mohini teacher and Umesh Mallya who taught English in fifth and sixth standard, helped him a lot in studying the language.

“He used to study his daily lessons. I used to sit beside him. He reads newspaper between 6 pm and 7 pm and used to study his lessons from 7 pm to 9.30 pm,” says Kini.

Another success

Rakesh who is also suffering from hearing impairement has also passed SSLC examination. He is the student of Canara High School, Dongarkeri.

He has scored 50 in Kannada, 42 in Maths, 37 in science, 30 in Social Studies. He was given exemption for second and third languages. He is the son of Sadanand and Geetha of Padavinangady, His father is an electrician.

Geetha said: “We had given him training in speech and hearing at Mangalajyothi Integrated School before enrolling him to normal school. I feel happy at his success.”