Disability is child's play! South Mumbai gets first disabled-friendly garden

A merry-go-round with a difference

For disabled kids, Friday was a beautiful day as they made a beeline for the brand new, custom-made swings that were brought in for a disabled-friendly garden inside Malabar Hill's Kamala Nehru Park. A project of the Rotary Club of Bombay Pier and the BMC, Mumbai's tony area launched the heart-warming initiative.

Launched by MLA Mangal Prabhat Lodha and BJP corporator Jyotsna Mehta, the garden was graced with the presence of kids from Society for the Education of the Crippled (SEC) day school in Agripada, many of them in wheelchairs.

Needed in SoBo
Mehta said that the garden "was an idea that was overdue in south Mumbai, considering it had no such facility." The corporator added that there would be special security in place as, "We have to maintain this space."

Dreams take wing on this swing. Pics/Sayyed Sameer Abedi

Surekha Chafe, principal SEC, said, "It was heartbreaking to see our kids stand around at regular playgrounds, in the few instances when they could even go there. Such places are very welcome."

Lodha said that the play space should be accompanied with drinking water facilities and a compact seating arrangement. "Mehta and I would like to be involved in providing that. Usually, the impression is that politicians are good at talking not doing," he said with candour, evoking some laughter.

An emotional resident of the area, Sunnil Mehra, who sponsored the play equipment, said, "I remember my parents bringing me to this garden when we were children. I am so happy to do something like this, for others."

Challenges over long-term
The merry-go-round, different from conventional roundabouts, was soon filled up as children afflicted with cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, polio found their space.

Vinod Gupta, an adult on crutches, with bilateral polio (polio in both legs), is a teacher with the Social Department of Continuing Education and Recreation with the school. He said, "When I was a child, I remember being carried around at a playground, there was certainly nothing like this space that we could access."

Amidst the bonhomie though, there are concerns that needed to be addressed, like long-term maintenance. A Bahrot, Walkeshwar resident opined, "Even before the launch, the merry-go-round had to be repaired twice."

Children rejoice
One of the kids, M Shaikh said, "We used to feel bad seeing able children play. I want to come here every day."

Another disabled boy, Aditya Kohli laughed when teased about whether he was the brother of cricketer Virat Kohli. A girl named 'Sona' afflicted with cerebral palsy was on a wheelchair on the swing. Sona was found some years ago, on the Railway tracks near Kalyan.

Her mother died and her alcoholic father had abandoned her. Asha Daan orphanage volunteers found her. From tears on the track to sunny smiles on the swing, Sona's radiance reflected the ecstatic abandon with which the children let themselves go, here.