SPJ Sadhana which celebrates 35 years this year, is an institution for the mentally challenged that aims at preparing its students for the real world THE fact that mentally challenged individuals have no reservation as opposed to the physically challenged who 
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Above, a student prepares for a fashion show with Hemant Trevedi; below, Vice Principal Radhike Khanna with her students; a student in a bead making class</td></tr></tbody></table>have three per cent in the employment sector doesn't hold back the staff of SPJ Sadhana, a school in the Sophia college campus.u00a0u00a0 It aims at 100 per cent employability after graduation, but is going at a steady rate of 93 right now. Meeting its principal Sister Gaitonde, vice principal Dr Radhike Khanna and the teachers, it is evident that they've managed a balance between empathetic and realistic: "We're not asking for charity, we want them to be productive members of society, like Dr Radhike always says, make them peers of tax and not only consumers of it," says Sister Gaitonde, who has been at the institution since 1990. The students aren't regarded as fragile. In fact, Jasmine, one of the teachers says that it's our own mind blocks that we need to get over when dealing with a disadvantaged person. Sister Gaitonde explains that the students have to be prepared for the big bad world, it's about making them stand up for themselves and erase the labeling of 'paagal', a term used loosely and unjustly in India. One of the things that struck me the most was when we were in the catering departmentthe students were making pizza and pasta, which is their favourite dish to cook, one of the boys tells me a teacher said that even if they cut their hands on a knife, it's okay, they know then not to do it again. The school began in the basement of Sophia College 35 years back when their building under the Kemps Corner flyover was demolished. No one was ready to take the teachers and students anywhere, until they came across the college. Today it houses 114 students till the ages of 22 and the schooling is divided into two sections: one for the initial years, between grades 1 and 4 and then progresses into a five-year polytechnic course for when the students become teenagers Visual arts and crafts, Office procedures, Hospitality and catering and General vocational. Sister Gaitonde tells us of the students' success stories with some of them even working at the Taj, "If you bring a paycheck you will be validated," she says. At SPJ Sadhana there are even students who were asked to leave other special schools due to violent behaviour. Sister speaks about the various challenges, like bite marks from the students, that are all part of the process. One of the boys who showed such violent behaviour now makes exquisite replicas of Van Gogh paintings. You see them hanging proud on the walls, words cannot do justice to the feeling... and all you've done is heard the story, whereas the staff have been feature players in it. Later, I meet the lively Dr Radhike Khanna, who has done her PhD in special education and was receiver of the Helen Keller Award as 'Role Model for Increased Employment Opportunities for the Disabled.' It's Radhike who is behind designing the five-year polytechnic course for the mentally challenged which is the only one of its kind in the world. One of the students comes up to her and hugs her, she knows each and every one of them. Parents in India still don't know how to deal with a mentally challenged child, "After they go to the dargas and mandirs, they come to us. It's very difficult for the mother and the siblings to handle such a child," says Radhike, "They are lost, when the blocks are in their parents' mind, where do they go?" With staff member Ritu as your guide, you go through the school, there are volunteers and teachers, some teaching children how to use a computer, some monitoring while the kids watch Finding Nemo as an introduction to the aquarium the next day. Most of the students are preparing for a fashion show with Hemant Trevedi that took place this Friday, who helps the students display their talent in an event called 'Because... I am.' The students are taught to say namaste, some smile shyly, some with openness. Then there's a section towards the end where the students are getting constructive by making bags, spectacle strings and chains. The students begin with big beads and then graduate to smaller ones. So here's a bunch of people whose aren't sitting on a change with idealism but making it with realism. They work towards making the city's people aware that a mental disability does not necessitate hopelessness and is definitely not an excuse for isolation or seclusion.

SPJ Sadhana which celebrates 35 years this year, is an institution for the mentally challenged that aims at preparing its students for the real world

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