Cuttack: Ashraya – The shelter, located in the CDA area of the Silver City, has received appreciation from several quarters for its unconditional care for persons with autism, cerebral palsy, mental challenge and hearing impaired.
Set up in 2005, the day care-cum-residential institution has become the address of altogether 227 mentally challenged persons.
District Child Welfare Committee (CWC) member Sujata Patnaik had set up Ashraya with the help of the guardians of seven mentally challenged children. However, Sujata’s well-wishers Gourikrushna Das and Umesh Chandra Patnaik, an engineer working in the USA, had contributed handsomely for Ashraya. But, the shelter house is yet to receive any aid from the government.
“We have been providing treatment and residential facilities to mentally challenged people within the age group of three to 50 years. Most of the inmates of Ashraya were deserted by their families,” said Sujata.
Though Sujata does not have a biological child of her own she has become a motherly figure to hundreds of mentally challenged persons of Ashraya. “All the inmates of the shelter house are my children. It is my duty to think for their wellbeing,” said Sujata.
According to Sujata, a woman had left her two and half-year-old mentally challenged daughter at the CWC a few years ago. The child was unable to move its legs and hands. Moreover, she was unable to speak anything. “We accepted the child from the CWC and gave her physiotherapy, massage therapy and Speech therapy. Now, her condition has improved a lot,” Sujata said.
A few years ago, railway authorities had rescued a six month-old girl child from a coach at Puri station. The mentally challenged child was brought to Ashraya at the behest of Sujata. “The child is now doing well. A few inmates of Ashraya were felicitated for their performance in a cultural programme in Delhi in 2015,” she said.
