From just two persons in 1975 to over 356 in 2004, the number of silent members of this club is rising by the day. Happily for it, the voiceless group has finally been able to speak out.

In a unique congregation held in the city, cancer patients from Calcutta, as well as neighbouring Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan, who have all lost their vocal organs to cancer, met to decide ways to avoid the dreaded disease, counter it and finally, fight till the end for their fellow-patients.

All of them had undergone surgery to get their voice box removed in order to live longer, but have paid a heavy price by becoming speechless forever.

“At the conference, we spoke about the need for training people to speak again with the help of the food-pipe muscles. The rising number of larynx cancer cases was also deliberated upon at length,” said Laryngectomee club founding-member Bibhuti Bhushan Chakraborty. He is also a speech therapist.

Three decades ago, Chakraborty went under the knife for removal of his voice box. After surgery, he learnt he would never speak again.

But, he did not give up hope, and finally succeeded in speaking by using the muscles of his food-pipe. This condition is medically called ‘oesophageal speech’.

Chakraborty learnt to speak by first inhaling air and then exhaling it. Later, he started to pronounce phonetically and soon perfected the technique of forming short sentences.

Now, he is a speech therapist for all cancer patients who lose their voice box, but want to learn how to speak. “Normally, it takes between a month and six months for a person to learn to acquire this special skill. It depends on how serious the surgery has been,” Chakraborty added.

The club has decided to set up a voice library of all the cancer patients, who learnt oesophageal speech so that other patients can draw inspiration.

During the conference, cancer specialists, including Saroj Gupta, and cancer patients interacted among themselves and the club decided to spread awareness about cancer among Calcuttans.

The club has also decided to extend its free service and rehabilitation to all cancer patients who have gone through the trauma of losing their voice to larynx cancer.

“We have decided to take up more counselling sessions for all cancer patients who are aware of this traumatic surgery, and are afraid to face the reality. Our members are there to teach them how to fight the silence and live a normal life,” Chakraborty added.