Participants at the workshop. Picture by Rith Basu

Jeeja Ghosh, 39, has cerebral palsy and cannot hold a pen. She appeared for ICSE from the Indian Institute of Cerebral Palsy and went on to complete her 10+2 from La Martiniere for Girls. Her next stop was Presidency College and then, University of Leeds. She is now works as a programme officer in the Human Rights Law Commission.

Born with arthogyposis (contraction of muscles at the joints, causing locomotive disability) Agnes D’souza had to be carried to school. But she hated being carried up to the classroom.

“I was determined to walk up the stairs and kept trying till I succeeded. In the bargain, I learnt to climb stairs before I learnt to walk,” said the middle school teacher with Loreto Convent, Entally, who uses callipers to walk. Agnes has a masters degree in international relations from Jawaharlal Nehru University.

Jeeja, Agnes and other bravehearts like them recently recounted their success stories for hundreds of women with impairment at a city auditorium.

According to the 2001 census, there were 93,01,134 disabled women in India, which is 41.5 per cent of the total number of disabled persons in the country.

The speakers also highlighted the need for educating challenged women. “We must first believe in ourselves. The cry must be for the right to education so that we can compete in the mainstream and earn ourselves a job,” Nandini Ghosh, who has locomotive difficulties, told the audience.

“The idea of job reservation is demeaning. It doesn’t liberate you in the true sense,” added Ghosh, a diploma holder in health and education from the University of Hertfordshire.

Suchandra Dutta, 19, who attended the workshop organised by NGO Sanchar — which works for the rights of people with disabilities — was “mesmerised” by the stories.

“Both my legs have been affected by polio and I have to use crutches. But while listening to the speakers, I realised that they had to overcome impairments many times worse than mine. This experience has given me a lot of heart,” said the first-year student of Vidyanagar College.

Amtala resident Pusposhree Das, 18, who lost her left hand from wrist down and the toes of her left feet in a fire as a four-year-old, was moved by Jeeja’s story.

“Being a patient of cerebral palsy, it is so much more difficult for her. When she spoke about how she first dared to board a public bus, I identified with her. She said she needed a writer for her exams. I realised I am actually quite lucky,” she said.