There are a good number of shelters and rehabilitation homes in and around Coimbatore, with orphaned children, the differently-abled, and the aged as their inmates.

Saarthy-Pammac is an association of parents of differently-abled children. Founded about 15 years ago, the centre aims at lending a helping hand to parents to understand their children, and offers counselling to them through experts. It supports the parents in all ways in the upbringing of their child.

“My son is physically-challenged. I came to know of this association through one of my friends and, since then, I have been visiting the centre with my son. It was because of this association that my son has taken up a certificate course in music,” Vimala (name changed on request), the mother of a differently-abled child, said.

Saarthy-Pammac has their centre located in Kanuvai on the outskirts of Coimbatore city. It functions like any vocational training centre. At this centre, children with mental and physical disabilities are taught vocational skills like making paper and cloth bags, and doing simple art work like sticking fancy buttons on the bags. Some of the bags also sport some light embroidery on them. All these, we are told, were made by the children who visit the centre, under the supervision of the caretakers at the centre. On and off, when a specialist visits Saarthy-Pammac, the children are trained on how to make flowers from paper and other material. These also serve as great decoration pieces.

“Whenever we get an opportunity, at exhibitions and shopping expos, we display the work of our children. We sell the products that our children make and each piece has a small note saying that it is a creation of a child who is differently-abled,” Meena R, one of the volunteers of Saarthy-Pammac, says. The funds that are collected by selling the products are used to run the centre.

Currently, Saarthy-Pammac has hundreds of parents as members.