The story of Vishwas began with a dream of partnering with people with disabilities, across different life stages and from different social contexts with one focused goal: enabling each one of them realise his/her potential and become equals in the society. In 2005, we began in the little village of Sanp Ki Nagli in Sohna, near Gurgaon, in a government primary school. The idea of working with chil
dren with disabilities came with several challenges, in terms of accessibility as well as attitudes. Vishwas was keen to reach the unreached in rural areas, so we began our work in villages but the lack of professional support forced us to step back and reconsider. We looked for a small place in Gurgaon instead: a place to begin, to implement our ideas and concepts of inclusive practices and refine them, so that we could then go back to the villages, equipped with new insight and understanding. After much search and struggle, we were allotted, in 2007, a nursery school building in Sushant Lok, Gurgaon, in a state of utter disrepair. It took us a challenging five months to make the building habitable and accessible, and then find the right people to staff it. Our first admissions were made in September 2007. The school took off, of course with its inclusive practices in place. Children streamed in, their parents eager and excited. Very soon we were full up- and had no capacity left even for one more child. We had to expand, and we turned to the Haryana government for help with our expansion. After persistent efforts, in March 2009, we were allotted a large, well-designed building, many times bigger than our previous premises in sector-46, Gurgaon. Unfortunately, it was in near- ruin and required tremendous effort to upgrade it to the current state. Getting this building was a real breakthrough. Here we could put our dreams of inclusion at all levels, with all its challenges, into reality. Once again to make use of this great opportunity, we had to ask for help from government and private bodies. Today, Vishwas covers an entire set of projects that carry forward and constantly reinforce our vision of inclusive education with exclusive attention. We work with adults and children, we work in urban and rural areas and we build training programmes for a whole new generation of professionals and care-givers. In a changing climate for Inclusive education at the National level, Vishwas has been at the forefront of this educational philosophy. Even before the successful enactment of the Right to Education (RTE) Act through parliament in April 2010, Vishwas was already experimenting with inclusion. And yes, we have our own stirring anthem: ‘Keh do andheron se chal pade hain hum’. At an individual level, it’s our daily invocation to duty, at an institutional level, it fosters confidence in the team and all its networks. Written by renowned lyricist and poet Prasoon Joshi, the inimitable Kailash Kher sang it with our students to a packed Siri Fort Auditorium in Delhi. To make all of this happen, we partner with both public and private institutions and passionate individuals committed to making a difference in this field. There are unique challenges in such collaborations and we believe, given our own experience since inception, that this is the only way to scale-up, to take Vishwas towards its objective of promoting positive change and empowerment. So, one of our key priorities is to expand our resources and build a much larger corpus. Only this will enable us to attract people with talent, training and commitment. A few years ago, all this was part of a dream.
