Annual Report 2010-2011 - National Trust

National Trust
being nurtured and I dream of it becoming a cooperative of the registered organizations
of that district. Our first micro enterprise, and that too in a rural area and with very
viable products. Congratulations to ARUNIM and a great sense of satisfaction for us
at the National Trust.
In November 2010, I was invited by PARIVAAR to attend a parents meeting in
Mysore. This group of parents is piloting a project on ‘Supported Decision Making’.
The parent’s organization there, has impacted the local community and made
remarkable changes in their attitude. As part of this group, there was a local
industrialist, a lawyer and a police officer. The industrialist, had employed 14 young
people with intellectual disability. Five of his employees were there with their families.
These boys exuded confidence and a joy of life. It was wonderful to interact with
them and the cherry on the cake was the employer, who in his speech, spoke about
how the young people with intellectual disabilities, had not been employed for charity,
but were indispensible in the factory. This is what we want to achieve for each one of
our stakeholders.
I was even more excited to hear the lawyer and the police officer, because it
seemed that the parents had sensitized them very successfully. They spoke about all
that they had learnt from people with disabilities. They spoke about collaboration,
about candidness, about the ability to look clearly and state any fact in the most simple
and direct way. The families here, had internalized the values of evolving capacity
and diversity.
Positive learning experiences like these have helped to reflect on how to replicate
them across the country.
We have chosen a beautiful poem on ‘Diversity’ for the back cover of our Annual
Report, we do hope it helps to build the perspective that Disabled People are part of
the human diversity and experience. They are not apart, to be isolated and kept away,
but are a part.
Of course, the year has had many struggles too. Each one of our programmes,
needs a new thought and strategy to take it further.
Our one concern has been the residential facilities ‘Samarth’ and how to ensure
their quality of services, sustainability and a productive monitoring and evaluation
system. We have the whole range, good, average and very poor organizations. We
are trying to work out strategies that will help us to have a clear objective and ensure
the success of most of the projects. Our studies show that many of the organizations
lack in knowledge of good governance, transparency, planning and fund raising. They
also seem, not to truly believe in the evolving capacity of the residents and of their
organizations. They do not seem to realize that people and organizations are dynamic
and need to grow and evolve. One of our most important goals is to help these
organizations to develop, so that they can be really good and effective facilities for
people with disabilities, who do not have family support. I do hope, we can resolve
these challenges in ‘Samarth’ and our other programmes.
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