The Indian Academy of Cerebral Palsy, Hyderabad had proposed 3^rd October to be celebrated as National Cerebral Palsy Day to create awareness about the disability. At the Mumbai Cheshire Home, Asha CBR project, we actively participated and helped to organize this occasion.  Together, we organized a painting competition, a signature campaign, an awareness generation program and an exciting air-ride around Mumbai.

 

The objective of this occasion was –

 

 

To mark the National Cerebral Palsy day, we conducted a painting competition for children living with cerebral palsy. 10 children and 14 parents took part in the competition. The children were asked to fill colors in a picture and parents also helped the children to do the same. The event was a great source of fun and joy to the children who enjoyed the activity and were all given prizes for the same.

 

Apart from the drawing competition, we also actively took part in the mega event organized by the Indian Academy of Cerebral Palsy. A total of 35 children, parents, and staff attended this program from the Mumbai Cheshire Home. The occasion was marked by informative addresses such as by the Chairperson, Dr. Johari who spoke about the need to spread awareness about cerebral palsy. Dr. Dhruv who is the physiotherapist guide of the Mumbai Cheshire Home Asha CBR project, gave more information about this disability in specific. After this, Mr. Vaibhav Sakhare of the Government of India Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan Department informed us about the facilities available for disabled persons in the form of government schemes and entitlements.

 

We also spoke about the work done by the Asha CBR project and urged family members to contact us whenever they needed our support. The program came to a grand end with various cultural activities organized by children with cerebral palsy from our project. They performed a skit, few songs, a dance performance and there was also a demonstration of karate skills by children with cerebral palsy children. The evening ended with some snacks and informal sharing among all those who were present.

 

To reach out to the government and to spread awareness about the needs of children with cerebral palsy, we also organized a signature campaign where 14 parents spoke about their difficulties and needs. We wrote a letter to the Chief Minister of Maharashtra and mentioned points pertaining to education, accessibility and provision of basic amenities for disabled children and persons. All letters were collected and submitted to the Chief Minister’s office.

 

The day ended with another grand event. The Academy had contacted some supportive pilots who were more than happy to take our children with disabilities for a short air ride around Mumbai. This was a great opportunity for the children who had not ridden an aero plane before. 14 children with cerebral palsy from different NGOs took part in this ride and 3 children from the Mumbai Cheshire Home ASHA CBR Project, Shashi Kumar, Ajay Parvade and Harshal Ghag were among them. It was a very pleasant ride and the children had great fun.

 

The experience was completed when the children also got to meet the cine super star Shahrukh Khan who was present in the airport that day. He was very happy to see the children and to hear about the initiative. He blessed the children and spent some time with them. The children were also interviewed by a local paper for publishing an article about the entire day’s events.