The Malsawm Initiative- A School for Children with special needs

Persons with Disabilities (PwDs) have long been removed from the mainstream, without any services, care, or attention in our district called Churachandpur, Manipur. This taboo has been culturally internalized and accepted into the social structure, oppressing PwDs regardless of their various abilities.

In 2005, the founding director of CCI was blessed with a baby boy (L) Ginmalsawm, a firstborn, who was later found to have Optic Nerve Atrophy since birth, which made him visually impaired. In the process of finding the console, they learned that there was no single organisation to support PwDs in the district, not to even mention the state. It has been the experience of the hill district that the Persons with Disabilities community live in desperation, a frustration compounded by a sense of worthlessness and humiliation.

This has been an eye-opener for CCI. Therefore, against all odds, parents of such PwDs were identified, mobilized, and encouraged to join hands in taking up the initiative of The Malsawm Initiatives: A School for Children with special needs (TMI). TMI is still at its nascent stage and function with basic facilities by constantly struggled to manage the initiative through well-wishers, local fundraising and few teacher support through from various donor.

The Malsawm Initiatives (TMI): A School for Children with special needs was established purely based on the irrefutable demand conveniently ignored for generations.

Though TMI highly desired to provide maximum services with inclusive equal opportunity for all, it presently has an accommodation capacity only for 25 children. Therefore, the organization has procured some land and is incorporating a wider range of services like open-door service, early intervention, and home-based and village-based rehabilitation.

CCI works at three layers.

i. CCI provides inclusive education and rehabilitative support to PwD children.

ii. It builds capacities of parents, siblings, family members of PwDs, staffs of CCI, etc.

iii. It sensitizes, mobilizes and advocates for building inclusive spaces with schools, health care centers, churches, other institutions. CCI mobilizes parents and has formed them into a group called Parents Support Group (PSG) who emerged as a strong advocacy body in Churachandpur district. Besides all the above supports, CCI believes that building capacities of their siblings is the most vital and effective approach to bringing sustainable intervention.

TMI is strongly determined in enabling inabilities and enhancing capacities of persons with disabilities and continue to contribute to making the world more friendly for persons with disabilities. Its impact continues to be visible and TMI believes that the initiative will continue to grow and sustain to a point where one day, it with be managed by the very contribution and participation of its students of today.

TMI organizes advocacy, activism, and other activities for empowerment and awareness on disability in the district with limited available resources. Till date, parents, siblings, and family members are empowered with basic required communication skills to support them to communication between students with hearing/speech impairment and parents/siblings/staffs has been greatly improved or made possible.