Kanyakumari Rural Development Society abbreviated as KARD is the outcome of the initiative of persons committed to the integrated development of disabled persons. But we are very clear from the very beginning that the community shall take care of the target group. ‘Taking care’ here refers to the participation of and the contribution by the community.
Thus the focal point of our strategy is on Community Based Rehabilitation of the persons with multiple disabilities. The idea behind the CBR concept is that the affection and recognition accorded by the family particularly mothers – contribute to a great extend towards the socio-physical and cultural development of the disabled.
The rich and upper middle class people can afford trained nurses to look after their disabled children. But these children loose the emotional security from the mothers which in turn blocks their emotional intelligence. This is the tragedy of the mentally retarded children in our working area- Kanyakumari district.
Before we go into the depth of the problem, it is appropriate here to dwell on some of the basic characteristics / features of mental disability. The World Health Organization declares that 3% of the population of any country is disabled. But mentally retarded presons constitute 0.5%. At this conservation estimate, the Mentally Retarted persons in our district is about 30,000 to 40,000 as the district population is beyond two million. Though the figure is alarming, we need nit panic. To rectify, it is enough if we lanch a concerted community based rehabilitation campaign to rehabilitate these persons. This project idea is the driving force of the initiative of KARD’s CBR approach.

The Vision of KARD is to motivate the community people to contribute and participate in Community Based Rehabilitation of mentally retarded persons.

• • That all the persons are created equal.
  • The disability exists only in thinking not at the functional level.
  • The mentally retarded children/persons are also the children of God hence they deserve concern and love.
  • The community has a moral responsibility to look after the psycho-physical needs and problems of MR persons.

With this mission and vision we started this SPASTICS CENTRE OF KANNYAKUMARI (SPASTI), a special school exclusively for mentally challenged children of Nagercoil Municipal Area.

KARD is concentrating on the rehabilitation of othopadically and mentally disabled persons in three blocks of Kanyakumari district. We have running three special schools (one residential and two daycare) all for the mentally challenged children.
The target people-both children and adults hail from poor families but neglected to deprivation and depravity due to either ignorance or poverty. Some of them are even chained in the backyard or left to begging for their day today survival. Many parents are in a vexed state of mind that they leave their mentally disabled child uncared at home, either chained or locked up in a room. Those parents who are employed could not look after their special child at home. They find it very difficult to manage their special child by employing a servant maid, even though they are well to do. Hence they either chain their special child or lock them up in a room during day time, till they return back from their job. These special children starve and are isolated till evening and the result is these child becomes violent and highly disturbed.

Against this background we have attempted to identify four hundred and eighty six mentally challenged persons in Nagercoil Municipal Area and are providing special education, needed therapies, recreation games and vocational training to eighty six most deserving special children. We could not admit many children since we have very little infrastructure and conveyance facilities. These children come to school to attend special education and inter-personal relationship techniques in this Special School by seven well-trained staff. Apart from these we provide literacy and numeracy and aim at the attitudinal and behavioral changes of both, the community people and also the mentally challenged towards each other. We have developed good rapport with the parents and hence we extract parent’s contribution in each and every activity of rehabilitating their special child.
Apart from this we have established good rapport and working relationship with Government Primary Health Centers, Private Hospitals/Clinics, Government Hospitals, Social Welfare Department,Revenue Department, District Disabled Rehabilitation Department, Banks and District Collectorate. We have been sensitizing the people of the community to contribute to this project in all respects.
It is not the money which alone matters, we need comments and suggestions to run this kind of innovative program. The consultants and the well wishers help our program with their comments and suggestions without which we could not have developed such a special school for the mentally disabled children. They have also contributed towards the needs both in cash and in kind for our program, on our request. It is out of the sincere service of our staff team that we have been running the program successfully. More and more people are being sensitized by our motivated staff. It is a long way we have come and we have crossed thirteen long years in this program. We started with five de centralized centres in the year 1998 around Nagercoil Municipal Area catering twelve to twenty five children in each centre. In the year 2001 we clubbed together all the five centres and SPASTI we started. Till the year 2003 we were in a rented building and in the year 2004 we moved to our present new campus which is spacious enough and airy. As the children grow up we have to concentrate on their vocational rehabilitation. We separated boys from our SCHOOL FOR THE MENTALLY RETARDED and brought them here to this home and maid this a vocational training centre for boys and are providing them vocational training. Since abandoned mentally challenged of our area must be concentrated we have giving priority to abandoned mentally challenged persons in this centre. Now we have fifty two abandoned mentally challenged persons staying in this centre for vocational training.

We do not have enough infrastructure facilities to accommodate more number of special children. Though we have enough land for this Home for the special inmates, we do not have separate vocational training centre to conduct classes for them. Need for adequate four wheeler vehicles is also a major constraint to provide conveyance to the special children-to take them to the Hospital , to collect the donated food and other material from the donor’s houses to our centre.

Here we appeal to the government departments, NGOs and private philanthropists to extend their support on three sectors. The government shall extend full support and co-operation to this kind of rehabilitation programs. The NGOs shall come forward to start such Rehabilitation programs, by tapping and utilizing the locally available resources. The people of the community and the parents of special children to make use of this kind of facilities provided by the NGOs to develop a change in the attitude and behavior of the special children and also the community people towards each other.
We request the Non Governmental Organization to start rehabilitation programs like this for the special children in their own operational area along with their regular programs and project activities, since this is one of the priorities of our district.
We welcome visitors to our SPASTICS CENTRE OF KANNYAKUMARI (SPASTI) for your suggestions and comments on this program.

Spastics Centre of Kanyakumari (SPASTI)
Puliady,
Putheri P.O, Nagercoil,
Kanyakumari District-629 001
TamilNadu, India
Phone: 04652 295247