Autistic Children's Welfare Foundation
Coming to aid of autistic children
Autistic children are being taken care of at the Autistic Children's Welfare Foundation School in the port city.Photo: STAR
Autistic Children's Welfare Foundation that started its journey at a three-storey building in the port city in October last year has expanded its activities in the capital on April 11 in an effort to provide support to the autistic children. Its activities started temporarily at a building of Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) at Mirzarpole in the port city to help the autistic children lead a normal life amid manifold problems. The Foundation, a non-profit organisation, is now taking care of 28 autistic children under the supervision of 22 teachers, three parent teachers and two helping hands, sources said. Success in the endeavour has inspired the organisation to launch its branch at Mirpur-12 in the capital on April 11, said Foundation Director (Admn) Lt Col Tofael. While visiting the foundation office at Mirzarpole on Thursday, all the teachers and staffs were seen busy in guiding the autistic children on all the floors of the building with patience and tenderness. Foundation Principal Tahmina Zarin said the autistic children come here with multiple problems like belated development of speaking ability, stereotyped or repetitive use of language, little or no eye contact, lack of interests in relationships, persistent preoccupation with parts of objects and inflexible adherence to specific and non-functional routines or habits. Besides, they usually are habituated to avoiding crowd or interaction that force us to engage one teacher for one child and use separate and rare training equipments and therapy, which are expensive, she said. “The teachers here are to show patience and serve with motherly love as these children need special care,” she said. Child Specialist Dr Basana Muhuri, a life member of the foundation and mother of an autistic child, said the building is small and conjested. “In fact, more space and further improved atmosphere are required to provide proper support to the autistic children and bring change in their behaviour,” she said. She said number of patients are increasing everyday, but the foundation is not able to provide them treatment properly while some so-called autistic centres are just cashing on the situation and making money in the name of training and rehabilitation. She said she visits the foundation every Saturday and train the teachers and mothers with her experiences. She said children develop autism genetically while abnormal formation of brain and some other abnormal chemical activities in brain are responsible for this. She waved aside link of love or care with the development of autism while emphasising specialised training, education and rehabilitation to help such children lead a life like other normal children. Referring to the service at the foundation, General Secretary Mahbubul Haque Khan said they receive only Tk 56,000 from 28 students as fees a month against the expenditure of around Tk 1.58 lakh. He said they are unable to accommodate more autistic children here since the foundation runs in a building that we are bound to vacate at any time if CCC wants. “But, we are under pressure to increase number of children and their facilities” he added. Mahbubul said the Foundation runs on donation on different organisations and individuals. He said it needs its own land, modern equipment, specialised training for the teachers and government patronisation for its smooth functioning.
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