Geetanjali Krishna: Special needs, special challenges

PEOPLE LIKE THEM

The hall hummed with activity as the 50-odd workers slipped bills into envelopes. One of them frowned when he saw that he hadn't applied the gum evenly across the envelope rim, and painstakingly dotted the gum until it was in a perfect, unbroken line.

"My students excel in this job," said Dr Auluck, president of Muskaan, a centre for the mentally challenged, "boredom is not a word that they know, and they can go on and on till their task is completed."

We were walking through the mass mailing centre of the institute, where Auluck's flock was inserting 17,000 MTNL bills into envelopes.

It was a task for which they were both well suited and well trained "" all the people working there had received training at a Delhi post office in mailing techniques.

The confidence on the trainees' faces was palpable, and they called out cheery greetings to us as we passed them. When I'd shaken hands with the nth person,

Mrs Auluck smiled, "Their confidence stems from the fact that they are working and being useful. And you should see how great they feel when we give them a share of profits!

It's their own money, and I guess, just like for the rest of us, that makes it infinitely more precious!" Muskaan now runs four vocational training centres "" masala making, stationery and block printing, candle making and mass mailing.

The masalas packaged by Muskaan are much in demand, and their sales have grown from 18 packets a month to 2,000 packets a month today. The stationery unit has recently begun to make office files, in addition to the usual cards, notebooks etc.

"Simple manual tasks that don't involve fine judgements are best suited for our trainees," said Mrs Auluck, "and within those parameters, they perform as well, if not better than, so-called 'normal' people!"

But Auluck and her dedicated band of teachers are facing a sad problem today: "We have 20 students who are ready to take on jobs or work.

But unfortunately, we've not been able to convince people to give them work to do," she rued. Whether its ignorant prejudice or just inertia, few corporates are willing to give her trainees a chance to show that they too are capable of good honest productive work.

The only two exceptions are MTNL and Action Aid, who get all their mass mailing done by Muskaan trainees. Last year, Muskaan sold Rs 5 lakh worth of products, including packaged masalas, candles and cards.

However, the income from these few activities is not proving enough for the ambitious plans that Auluck and her staff have for Muskaan. "We have 70 students right now, aged between 15 and 55, but have space to accommodate at least 30 more.

Then, we are very keen to start residential facilities "" after all, once they cross 35, their parents are often too old to look after their special needs," said Auluck.

While Muskaan does get a sizeable amount in donations, that's just not enough. "We want our trainees to get regular work, the income is of secondary importance.

The very fact of being employed gives them the kind of boost that nothing else can," said she.

I left Muskaan that day with a much better understanding of what people with special needs can accomplish, provided they get the opportunity.

Given that as much as 3 per cent of our population has a mental handicap of some sort, it's time the mainstream became sensitive to them.

Or is it that in our nation's 56th year of democracy, we, the citizens, are still not civilised enough to accept people not quite like us?

(geetanjalikrishna@yahoo.co.uk)