In the surroundings of Dir town, according to a survey of social welfare department, there are approximately 400 children with disabilities. The most common disabilities are dumbness, deafness, lame, blind and mental disability.

1. In the surroundings of Dir town, according to a survey of social welfare department, there are approximately 400 children with disabilities. The most common disabilities are dumbness, deafness, lame, blind and mental disability. Unfortunately the government did not take the issue of disable children serious and that is why the special education was approved back in 2011 and till 2014 there was no building, no teacher and no equipment for these children. In January 2013, the deputy commissioner Dir Upper requested SRSP to rehabilitate the special education center of Dir so that special children in the vicinity can be benefited. SRSP in consultation with the district officer social welfare surveyed the center and approved rehabilitation works in light of suggestions from the concerned instructor.
“It was like a day of grief in our family when we came to know that Neelam is dumb and deaf and she would never ever be able to hear and speak. I remember I along with my wife were crying that whole night and we were thinking of all options that can give back my daughter her speech” said Noorullah the father of Neelam.
Children with physical and mental disabilities experience personal limitations in the social,
SRSP has joined hands with European Union under the Programme for Economic Advancement and Community Empowerment (PEACE) for the development of deprived and disasters struck population of Malakand division. Under the PEACE, SRSP in Dir Upper has rehabilitated 20 government facilities that were either blown by bomb blasts by Taliban or by flash floods in 2010. The special education center in Dir town is one of these facilities rehabilitated by SRSP under PEACE. There are total 51 special children registered in the center while 32 children regularly come to the center. Before the center was rehabilitated by SRSP under PEACE, it was functional in a rented building and now the education department has allotted a space to the center where SRSP intervened and rehabilitated and equipped the center with necessary items and equipment. The total cost of project was 596,219 PKR. The project was completed in September 2014.
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2. psychological and economic spheres, some of which can be alleviated with parental, community and governmental support. The critical task is developing and maintaining a focus on abilities rather than on disabilities, then honing those abilities to provide the greatest degree of personal autonomy. An estimated 1.4 million persons with disabilities in Pakistan were the children of school going age, most of whom do not have access to either inclusive or special schools due to limited capacity in existing facilities.
“we play cricket and we enjoy it playing in the ground of the center” these were the gesture words that I got from one of the children Ziaullah who dumb and the instructor in the center helped me in understanding the gestures of Ziaullah. The instructor said “before the rehabilitation work completed by SRSP, we usually discourage parents to send their children to the center as there were no facilities, no playing area and therapy equipment. Now we encourage and mobilize parents to send their children to the center and we use a carry van for pick and drop of these children”.
“The center helped in mitigating the vexation caused by the fact that my son can no longer live a normal life as he was paralyzed on both his feet” said the father of 11 year old yasir.
There is still a need of raising awareness of parents and society on the rights of these disable children and the government should also give due importance to the issue. As the instructor said “the parents of disable children still do not know how to treat their children and hence sensitization of these parents is of equal importance”.
GALLERY
Besides the physical work i.e. construction of boundary wall, water supply, main gate, swing, slide, see saw and white wash the other items provided in the center includes stimulator, diathermy machine, static cycle, 5 wheel chairs, 4 walkers, examination coach, shoulder pulley, patient’s bed, jogging machine, massage machine, 10 balloons, 2 carpets and 2 infra red rays machines.
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