Sunday, Sep 26, 2004
Sunday, Sep 26, 2004 |
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Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Karnataka
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Bangalore
By Our Staff Reporter
BANGALORE, SEPT. 25. Eight-year-old Syed Irfan, who was carried to the stage of the Good <129>Shepherd auditorium here today by his teacher, received the power to move off stage on his own. The physically challenged boy from Mangalore was presented the 25,000th wheelchair of the `Joni and Friends International Wheels for the World' programme by the quadriplegic, Joni Earekcon Tada, founder of the programme. Irfan, who was born in the seventh month, has a contracture at both knees that prevents him from walking. As part of the international programme, India received 400 wheelchairs this year. Two hundred of them have been distributed to differently-abled children in the city by non-governmental organisations. The country had earlier received 181 wheelchairs. There are plans by `Wheels for the World' to expand the programme to offer more wheelchairs each year and to distribute them to more cities. Around five per cent of the India's population is differently-abled, according to statistics provided by proVision Asia, a non-governmental organisation. There is an estimated need for 14 lakh wheelchairs and tricycles, 46 lakh callipers, and 10 lakh walking sticks. The wheelchairs supplied have been collected in the United States and refurbished by prison inmates before being shipped to differently-abled children in 60 countries. A therapist fits the child to the chair, and on this trip three dairy farmers from the United States donned the role of therapists who repaired the chairs and fitted them to the children. At the programme, Ms. Tada gave an account of how she developed the disability and her efforts to triumph over it. The Minister for Municipal Administration, S.R. More, praised the efforts of the `Wheels for the Worlds.'
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