SAMARTHANAM – NGO for Blind and Disabled People Date: 12/7/2008
As a small child I often would say “ I want to become a doctor and serve the poor in some remote village………I still remember in my school days we were supposed to write in a book one good deed that we do for the day. And my dream was to write about me helping a blind man to cross the road and would always look out for one whenever I would go out. But never got a chance to do so. As I grew and joined engineering invariably my New Year resolution would be not to use plastic cover, and not to throw rappers or covers on road and I would either find a trash bin or get it home to dispose.
Last Saturday, when I was discussing with my brother about various issues regarding the disposal system of the city he told me about “SAMARTHANAM”. That triggered my desire of childhood days of helping blind serving country, the poor and my views of keeping city clean and I could do all of these through Samarthanam.
I visited Samarthanam with my brother last Saturday and the visit just made my day. There are so many ways to serve country, the poor and the needy it’s just that one has to make up their mind.
PIC 1: The waste plastics which we took to the Samarthanam
I would brief you all what I saw and learnt about Samarthanam and believe me if you want to help poor, disabled and the needy and also interested in disposing the wastes like plastic, e-wastes, newspaper and metals u now know where to go.
SAMARTHANAM is an NGO for disabled. This organization was established in the year 1997 bringing in together the three visually impaired graduates Mr. Mahantesh, Paul Muddha and Nagesh. Samarthanam is an NGO which started with the primary goal as to provide the visually impaired shelter and education with 3 disabled children.
When we (I and my brother) went to the office we were greeted by Mr. Prashanth who gave us an overall picture about the organization Samarthanam, its aims and activities and fund rising issues. The office since was a part of the woman’s hostel we could see many visually impaired girls walking around doing things on their own.
As a small child I often would say “ I want to become a doctor and serve the poor in some remote village………I still remember in my school days we were supposed to write in a book one good deed that we do for the day. And my dream was to write about me helping a blind man to cross the road and would always look out for one whenever I would go out. But never got a chance to do so. As I grew and joined engineering invariably my New Year resolution would be not to use plastic cover, and not to throw rappers or covers on road and I would either find a trash bin or get it home to dispose.
Last Saturday, when I was discussing with my brother about various issues regarding the disposal system of the city he told me about “SAMARTHANAM”. That triggered my desire of childhood days of helping blind serving country, the poor and my views of keeping city clean and I could do all of these through Samarthanam.
I visited Samarthanam with my brother last Saturday and the visit just made my day. There are so many ways to serve country, the poor and the needy it’s just that one has to make up their mind.
PIC 1: The waste plastics which we took to the Samarthanam
I would brief you all what I saw and learnt about Samarthanam and believe me if you want to help poor, disabled and the needy and also interested in disposing the wastes like plastic, e-wastes, newspaper and metals u now know where to go.
SAMARTHANAM is an NGO for disabled. This organization was established in the year 1997 bringing in together the three visually impaired graduates Mr. Mahantesh, Paul Muddha and Nagesh. Samarthanam is an NGO which started with the primary goal as to provide the visually impaired shelter and education with 3 disabled children.
When we (I and my brother) went to the office we were greeted by Mr. Prashanth who gave us an overall picture about the organization Samarthanam, its aims and activities and fund rising issues. The office since was a part of the woman’s hostel we could see many visually impaired girls walking around doing things on their own.
PIC 2: Prashanth, My Sister (Sindhu) and a visually impaired guy working in this org.
Ms Sunitha who is also working for the organization also gave us detailed working methods of the organization and its activities. Though the organization started with the intension of helping the physically challenged group it gradually extended to also help the children from economically weaker sections of the society.
PIC 3: visually impaired guy working in Samarthanam and Ms Sunitha.
They have three programmes which forms the present activities of the organization.
1) SWADHAR -Integrated Education for the Disabled(IED)Ms Nirmala Dixit who is working with Samarthanam in the IED project gave us an insight of the project.
* IED is a central government aided project which aims at educating disabled students in regular schools. Samarthanam has identified 303 such children in and around Bangalore. It has 21 teachers who along with B.E.D have a special training i.e Multi categorical teachers training done to help the disabled. The
salary to these teachers is given by government through Samarthanam trust.
* They also have distribution programme where they provide all the necessary equipments like hearing aids, spectacles and so on.
* They also provide all the children with free hostel facilities. They house about 200 children mainly disabled and children coming from EWS.
Ms Sunitha who is also working for the organization also gave us detailed working methods of the organization and its activities. Though the organization started with the intension of helping the physically challenged group it gradually extended to also help the children from economically weaker sections of the society.PIC 3: visually impaired guy working in Samarthanam and Ms Sunitha.
They have three programmes which forms the present activities of the organization.
1) SWADHAR -Integrated Education for the Disabled(IED)Ms Nirmala Dixit who is working with Samarthanam in the IED project gave us an insight of the project.
* IED is a central government aided project which aims at educating disabled students in regular schools. Samarthanam has identified 303 such children in and around Bangalore. It has 21 teachers who along with B.E.D have a special training i.e Multi categorical teachers training done to help the disabled. The
salary to these teachers is given by government through Samarthanam trust.
* They also have distribution programme where they provide all the necessary equipments like hearing aids, spectacles and so on.
* They also provide all the children with free hostel facilities. They house about 200 children mainly disabled and children coming from EWS.
* They have IT cell to educate its visually challenged students, the use of computers with the help of software JAWS(Job Access With Speech).
PIC 4: IT CELL
PIC 5: Computer Systems
* They also have a placement cell for these disabled students to find placements in various companies.
PIC 6: Blind Teacher for Blind Students.
* They have doctors coming from Sanjay Gandhi Hospital for the medical regular checkups.
SPORTS & CULTURAL ACTIVITIES
* They students of Samarthanam are encouraged to participate in many sports like chess, cricket and surprisingly the visually impared students have their own cricket team.
* They have a separate cultural wing. They have emerged as artists, accomplished singers, dancers, instrumentalists and mimics etc…
2) Vidya Prasad – Mid – day meal Programme:
Samarthanam has been providing free mid-day meals to children studying in Government schools under the Akshara Dasoha project since 2003.
This program covers 35,000 children in 200 schools. To expand and strengthen this service, the Ministry of Finance, Govt. of India has granted 35AC. All donations towards this programme are 100% tax exempted.
3) Parisara – Recycling the Wastes:
With the good intensive for the disposal of wastes like plastics, metals, news papers and e-wastes, Samarthanam has a project called Parisara. Here they collect above mentioned wastes from MNC companies, individuals and partly will be used for Brailing and the rest is to generate fund by sending them to respective suitable recycling companies like ITC etc…
Friends my intension of posting this is can we also help these visually impaired friends? We can do it in many ways so that they can find their future through Samarthanam. A few are mentioned below:
Rs 600 per month or Rs 6000 per annum towards one Child Sponsorship Programme to be used for lodging, boarding, and other educational expenses of the child.
Monthly or Yearly fixed contributions may be made in Rs 100 / Rs 1000 or multiples there of to meet their general expenses.
A day’s food could be sponsored.
Breakfast – Rs. 1500
Lunch or dinner – Rs. 2500
Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner – Rs. 6500
Contributions may be made to the Computer Cell of Samarthanam either in cash or kind
Contributions in kind may include groceries, utensils, tables, office equipments, books, stationary, Braille states, tape recorders, old newspapers, magazines etc. These will be used for their Hostel, Office and IT projects.
We can arrange cultural shows in our area or office (IT) cultural functions to help showcase the talents of their cultural troupe
Donation of old Newspapers to Samarthanam.
Contribution in cash or kind to help celebrate memorable events like birthdays, marriage anniversaries etc at Samarthanam. You can even select the menu you wanted J
All Contributions and donations can be made by cash/DD/check made in favor of ‘Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled’ payable at Bengaluru.
Donations made to Samarthanam are exempt under u/s 80G of IT Act.
Donations to Vidya Prasad ‘Mid Day Meal’ Programme are exempt u/s 35AC (100% tax exempted)
If the current position of yours is not allowing you for contribution even though you are willing then contact me so that all of us contributing some amount can make a big amount J and help our friends…
For Further details about Samarthanam please visit http://www.samarthanam.org/
* They have doctors coming from Sanjay Gandhi Hospital for the medical regular checkups.
SPORTS & CULTURAL ACTIVITIES
* They students of Samarthanam are encouraged to participate in many sports like chess, cricket and surprisingly the visually impared students have their own cricket team.
* They have a separate cultural wing. They have emerged as artists, accomplished singers, dancers, instrumentalists and mimics etc…
2) Vidya Prasad – Mid – day meal Programme:
Samarthanam has been providing free mid-day meals to children studying in Government schools under the Akshara Dasoha project since 2003.
This program covers 35,000 children in 200 schools. To expand and strengthen this service, the Ministry of Finance, Govt. of India has granted 35AC. All donations towards this programme are 100% tax exempted.
3) Parisara – Recycling the Wastes:
With the good intensive for the disposal of wastes like plastics, metals, news papers and e-wastes, Samarthanam has a project called Parisara. Here they collect above mentioned wastes from MNC companies, individuals and partly will be used for Brailing and the rest is to generate fund by sending them to respective suitable recycling companies like ITC etc…
Friends my intension of posting this is can we also help these visually impaired friends? We can do it in many ways so that they can find their future through Samarthanam. A few are mentioned below:
Rs 600 per month or Rs 6000 per annum towards one Child Sponsorship Programme to be used for lodging, boarding, and other educational expenses of the child.
Monthly or Yearly fixed contributions may be made in Rs 100 / Rs 1000 or multiples there of to meet their general expenses.
A day’s food could be sponsored.
Breakfast – Rs. 1500
Lunch or dinner – Rs. 2500
Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner – Rs. 6500
Contributions may be made to the Computer Cell of Samarthanam either in cash or kind
Contributions in kind may include groceries, utensils, tables, office equipments, books, stationary, Braille states, tape recorders, old newspapers, magazines etc. These will be used for their Hostel, Office and IT projects.
We can arrange cultural shows in our area or office (IT) cultural functions to help showcase the talents of their cultural troupe
Donation of old Newspapers to Samarthanam.
Contribution in cash or kind to help celebrate memorable events like birthdays, marriage anniversaries etc at Samarthanam. You can even select the menu you wanted J
All Contributions and donations can be made by cash/DD/check made in favor of ‘Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled’ payable at Bengaluru.
Donations made to Samarthanam are exempt under u/s 80G of IT Act.
Donations to Vidya Prasad ‘Mid Day Meal’ Programme are exempt u/s 35AC (100% tax exempted)
If the current position of yours is not allowing you for contribution even though you are willing then contact me so that all of us contributing some amount can make a big amount J and help our friends…
For Further details about Samarthanam please visit http://www.samarthanam.org/
3 comments:
This review helped me a lot.
Thanks,
Smitha
Hi,
I completely agree with you vasista. I was also surprised on my first visit to Samarthanam.
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