Names are special to everyone. It is one’s identity, depicting a uniqueness that makes you different from everyone else. Names are also cherished because it reminds us that someone loved us enough to give us a unique name with a meaning. So, what does one do when someone who controls your life changes your name...Read More

Across India, advocacy groups, professionals, civil society groups, NGOs, and government are working in many different ways toward dignified and full lives for people with disabilities. Although the ways of moving forward may differ, most share this goal. What would it look like if the fullness of life were to be measured? Many indexes have...Read More

Valued roles are the vehicles to the good things of life. They are not static, but are ever evolving, growing, and changing. This applies not just to people with disabilities, but also to the whole community at large.Read More

People with disabilities often lead lives that are congregated and segregated. Relegated to the margins of society, they are locked up in spaces that sometimes do not even see what most of us take for granted.Read More

What does living at home mean? The answer to that question may be very different for different people. Many people with disabilities across India, particularly those who come from backgrounds of material poverty, have been stripped of home, and are seeking connections with family and roots. Choices and freely given relationships are so important and...Read More

Across India and the world, the institutional experience of being apart and away, locked in, and separated from society carries a huge number of wounding life experiences along with it. Sometimes the impact of the profound rejection and isolation from community causes people to go inward, so they survive by being quiet, compliant, and not...Read More

A strong and confident person is built from the many and varied experiences she has had in life. In fact, all of us are shaped and formed by those experiences. They prepare us for adversity, help us realize our preferences and options, and steer us toward the lives we choose. Many people with disability have...Read More

Janaki Amma loves hosting, making chai, and doting on her daughter. She is a woman with cognitive disabilities, with a frame frail and a great sense of humor. As we sit down for tea, she wants us to see her new shoes and clothes that she has folded with great care. She insists we have...Read More

Relationships and a sense of belonging fuel our lives, and give it meaning and a desire to thrive against all odds. However, in the lives of many people with disabilities, freely given, unpaid relationships are few, if at all. And this wound can shake the very core of one’s being.Read More

For many people with intellectual and developmental disability, especially those in segregated programs, waiting often becomes one of life’s most frequent activities. Waiting for someone to listen, waiting for the next activity, waiting for a family visit, waiting for the next meal, waiting for someone to assist you. For Sumitra, institutionalized for over a decade...Read More