Community radio triggers a change

Aims to help one understand why it's important to get one's child diagnosed

: Experts and parents of children with special needs along with young adults have started a weekly radio talk show, ‘Ek Nai Soch ...Ek Nai Disha’, with a Gurgaon-based community radio station, ‘Gurgaon Ki Awaaz’. It addresses the needs of hundreds of villages, semi-urban clusters and urban slums in Gurgaon.

Target listeners comprise large migrant families from lower income groups, typically migrant workers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh and local people from Haryana. The idea came up when Arti Jaiman, the founder and director of 'Gurgaon Ki Awaaz', in course of surveys, found out that a family had hidden away one of its members with disability in a room.

That was the turning point and Jaiman was convinced that a community radio can trigger change. The aim of the radio programme is to create behavioural awareness and sensitivity around disability, help one understand the varying nature of ability and the importance of getting one's child diagnosed.

“This programme is dedicated to children with any disability or special needs. We need to watch how we deal with our children in general. How we speak to them. Many children with special needs do not even have access to special educators,” said Jaiman.

Last Tuesday, at the inaugural episode, Ruchika Sethi Takkar shared the story of her 13-year-old daughter Manavi with intellectual and developmental delay. Takkar said that when she saw Manavi's struggle to live a respectful life and seek equal opportunities, it motivated her to fight for other social and civic causes too.

“The society has no right to condemn a child with disability simply because she is born with some impairment. To accept and include a child who is weak does not make others weak. There is huge stigma attached to disability in our society and we need to address this through such radio talk shows,” she said.

Experts and parents take questions from listeners in the live phone-in programme aired on 107.8 MHz at 11.30 a.m. every Tuesday.

The programme is aired on 107.8 MHz at 11.30 am every Tuesday.