Centre for Community Initiative (CCI) is a non-governmental, non-political, and non-profit organization founded on March 7, 2002, with a vision to create a healthy and just society with equal opportunities for all.
When the Secretary of CCI and his family personally experienced the lack of inclusion, and the absence of awareness, interventions, and facilities in the district through his son who was born with optic nerve atrophy, CCI made a major shift. With the firm belief that each individual, community, institution, and government contribute in their way to make a better world, CCI’s mission to build and strengthen society on health care, education, and socio-economic development through community initiative and participation found the right place to start. Thus CCI began focussing on disability and inclusion in its programme in 2007.
CCI has been working towards its vision through several initiatives that fall under education, advocacy, empowerment, and sustainable development in three districts of Manipur. These involve the Malsawm Ability Resource Centre (MARC), which includes the Malsawm Initiative (a school for children with special needs), early intervention, therapy services, Making Education Accessible for All (MEAL), Home School Programme, and Inclusive School Programme; Community Empowerment & Advocacy; Sustainable Development; Disability Inclusive Disaster Risk Reduction.
Location
CCI is based in a remote Churachandpur district of Manipur, a hilly and inaccessible region that borders Mizoram to the south and Myanmar to the southeast and east, where the over 2.7 lakhs population who are mostly tribal practice subsistence agriculture as a main occupation. The district is plagued with problems and challenges typical of any underdeveloped region where unemployment is rampant, and more because of insurgency and highly polarised society on communal lines. Therefore, CCI is born out of need through the joint initiative of like-minded individuals.
Making Education Accessible for All (MEAL) is necessitated because of the lack of resources for children with disabilities and the gap between whatever resources are available. Availability of resources does not necessarily mean they are accessible for many children with disabilities unless an accessibility feature is added for them. MEAL is to add that feature and bridge the gap between them through two key components i.e., Home School Programme and Inclusive School Programme through which CwDs are provided the opportunity of education at home and in schools.
Headed by a Coordinator, MEAL is based and implemented in Churachandpur town in the Churachandpur district of Manipur. The district has a predominantly tribal population of over 2.74 lakhs (2011 Census), of which 3.3% are estimated to be with various types of disabilities.
Home School Programme (HSP): Through HSP, fifty children with various types of disabilities between ages 0-18 who are confined at home are provided appropriate education including physiotherapy and counselling services. They are confined at home due to the nature of their disability, and/or from a financially weak family, and/or single-parent home, and/or in need of remedial education. The beneficiaries are identified through contacts among the disability community and through door-to-door visits. Once they are identified, a case history is built, a functional assessment is conducted, and an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) and Teaching Learning Materials are developed for each beneficiary based on which service is being provided. Services are provided three times a week or less, depending on specific cases, by four home teachers guided by special educators and a part-time physiotherapist. Counselling and training of family members of beneficiaries is also provided so that they can care for their child/sibling better and sustain the service. The beneficiaries are confined at home most of the time with very little or no socialization beyond family, an annual exposure event is also organized.
Inclusive School Programme (ISP): Children with disabilities who are ready for school through the HSP and other interventions have very limited opportunity to join schools in the Churachandpur district except TMI. TMI on the other hand has its challenges to accommodate them. So, for children with disabilities to have more opportunities for education, elementary sections of 6 mainstream co-ed schools; two govt. & four private schools are being capacitated on Inclusive Education by two Inclusive Educators. Two teachers from each school are provided training on Inclusive Education and taken on an exposure visit to a well-managed inclusive school. Handholding support is provided to them in their classrooms in curriculum adaptation, lesson planning, classroom management, development of TLMs, etc. Observations are shared; recommendations are made and are monitored in their implementation.
Operational:
As a part of the Making Education Accessible for All program, continue to provide services including education, physiotherapy, counselling and training, and fill the gap from the target 50 beneficiaries whenever the gap arises.
Educational:
Organizational:
Wipro Foundation is the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) entity of Wipro Limited. Going back over two decades, we focus on social initiatives in the domains of Education, Primary Healthcare, Ecology, Disaster Response, and Cities & Public Spaces.
Sachin Bansal heads finance function for Wipro Consumer Care & Lighting in India and South Asia.
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A qualified Chartered Accountant and a Black Belt in Six Sigma, Sachin has led several successful initiatives to streamline and strengthen the Finance function. As part of the leadership team of WIN, he played a pivotal role in driving profitable growth with improved focus on ROCE, Productivity and Cost Optimization.
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Aparna C. Iyer is Wipro’s Chief Financial Officer.
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He has been a vocal advocate for the critical importance of public systems, in particular the public education system. His many years in business have given him an insider’s view of both the possibilities and limits of markets. For the past few years, he has also been engaged with environmental and ecological issues. He writes widely, including a fortnightly column for the national newspapers Mint & Hindustan, and other publications.
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Narayan P S is the Global Head of Sustainability and Social Initiatives at Wipro Ltd. He is also the Managing Trustee at Wipro Foundation, the social initiatives arm of Wipro Ltd. He has been instrumental in the creation of Wipro’s sustainability initiative and has stewarded it since its inception in early 2008. Wipro’s sustainability charter is built on the core principle that business and social purpose must reinforce each other in addressing several key challenges around ecology and the environment, education, and communities.
In addition, Narayan is Visiting Faculty at the Azim Premji University where he teaches ‘Ecology and Development’ in the MA ( Development) program. He is also a Visiting Faculty at Xavier School of Sustainability, Xavier University, Bhubaneswar. Narayan also conducts learning sessions regularly on Sustainability at IIM Bangalore and IIM Indore.
Narayan’s interests center around (i) the broad interplay between Ecology, Economics, and Humanities (ii) the role of the business sector as a change agent in sustainable development (iii) Sustainability in Education, and (iv) Sustainable and Inclusive Cities.
Prior to the current role, Narayan was the Global Head of Information Systems for Wipro’s IT business, when he was chosen as one of CIO’s global 25 Ones to Watch.
A graduate in Electrical Engineering with a post-graduation in Management, Narayan has more than twenty-seven years of cross-disciplinary experience in Business Development, Enterprise Systems, and Corporate Sustainability. He is also involved in sustainability advocacy as a member of several industry forums on sustainability. He is currently the Chairman of the CII-GBC Greenco forum for Bangalore.
