First lady inaugurates goods exhibition prepared by intellectually challenged youth

KARACHI: The first lady of the country, Samina Alvi here on Saturday inaugurated an exhibition of goods prepared by local youth with challenged intellectual capacities.

The day long event themed “Hunarmand” was organized at Markaz e Umeed, the alma mater of these special entrepreneurs with the motive to mark beginning of their economic independence at a time when world in general was exposed to Covid 19 induced global challenges.

Ms Alvi expressing her interest in efforts being made for empowerment of the special individuals emphasized on the introducing the concept of inclusiveness and inquired about the strategy being adopted to enhance capacities as well as level of acceptance for such persons.

“Objective of the exercise is to groom intellectually challenged as low investment entrepreneurs and help them gain financial self reliance,” said Anusha Ali, Rehabilitation Manager of the rehabilitation cum training and education centre.

The first lady was informed that the centre was celebrating its 50th anniversary this year which was established to meet the education cum rehabilitation needs of special children mainly belonging to low income segments of society free of charge through the support of local philanthropists.

The schools presently being run in two shifts, was said to had dedicated its morning shift for children with compromised capacities encompassing intellectually challenged as well as those with any sort of impairments.

Hence, she said, the centre was providing package of special education and training, in accordance to their respective needs.

The first lady was informed that a pragmatic approach has been adopted for socio-economic rehabilitation of the youth, who were attending the school since their childhood under which collaboration has been developed with different institutions.

This approach enabled the young graduates to be groomed as skilled souls ultimately paving their way towards empowerment. Ms Alvi was informed that a number of furniture pieces, placed in the centre, were made by its very own graduates trained in carpentry while some of its students had also participated in different international events including special olympics and clinched medals for the country.