Prabin is innocent

Why does no one see Prabin as a child first, instead labelling him mentally ill and ignoring him?

A few weeks ago, UNICEF launched its global report, “The State of the World’s Children 2013: Children with Disabilities (CWDs)”. In Nepal, the UNICEF country office, along with disabled people’s organisations, held a grand ceremony to launch the Nepali translation of the report. As claimed by UNICEF, it is a flagship report on children’s disability. We should commend UNICEF for making the state of the world’s children with disabilities a global agenda.

The report has laid out strong ground for both local and global advocacy. I agree with the key recommendations of the report and its analyses. In countries like Nepal, the report observes, international commitment to building more inclusive societies has resulted in improvements in the situation of children with disabilities and their families but too many of them continue to face barriers to participation in civic, social and cultural affairs and thus, require more action. The report highly values the role of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and demands their ratification and implementation.

There is a catchy slogan in the report ‘See the child, before the disability’. Coincidentally, on June 10, 2013, Kantipur daily published a news report, “Chained for the last seven years” (page 9). The report was about a 12-year-old child who has been chained in his house for the last seven years because he has “lost his mind”. As suggested by the UNICEF report, while reading the news, I stopped thinking of the child’s disability but instead, visualised an innocent child chained like an animal. I imagined myself standing in front of him, holding the UNICEF report in my hands, wishing to free the child.

I was confused. How could I help the child? Kantipur reported that when Prabin was admitted to school—after six months—his teachers suggested that his parents “not send him to school”. Since then, he gradually developed mental instability. He neither speaks nor recognises anyone. If unchained, he runs away. Prabin has a twin brother who looks ‘normal’ for society. His father Tulsi Prasad left his job as a policeman during the Maoist insurgency. When Prabin was two and half years old, Tulsi Prasad went to Malaysia for work and returned home after four years. Since then, no one is employed in the family. One family member needs to always be around to look after Prabin. There are many elements in Prabin’s family— disability, mental illness, trauma from the conflict, migration and unemployment-all of which have collectively pushed the whole family into poverty and towards vulnerability.

I turn the pages of the UNICEF report in hopes of finding a solution. It says, in many countries, responses to the situation of children with disabilities are largely limited to institutionalisation, abandonment or neglect. These responses are the problem as they are rooted in negative or paternalistic assumptions of incapacity, dependency and differences that are perpetuated by ignorance. What is needed is a commitment to these children’s rights and their futures, giving priority to the most disadvantaged—as a matter of equity and for the benefit of all.

I look at government services. Prabin and his family are not supported  by any government welfare scheme. General health care services do not recognise the nature of Prabin’s problem as a health need. Civil society organisations, donors and the government, working to promote and protect child rights, do not identify any disadvantage in Prabin’s situation. Child rights activists do not hesitate to reply with a smile that Prabin is not a child with a disability. So the rights of children with disabilities do not apply to him.

What is this? Is it the collective apathy of society, the government and donors in the third world or is it Prabin’s fault that he suffers from a mental health problem? Why does no one see Prabin as a child first, instead labelling him mentally ill and ignoring him? I doubt if anyone felt ashamed by reading the report on Prabin. Prabin is innocent. Because of the ignorance and negligence of society, the government and donors, he has been chained for the last seven years.

As claimed by the UNICEF report, little will change in the lives of CWDs unless attitudes change. The government and donors should be the first ones to change negative attitudes. And it is important to make sure that Prabin receives good health care services but as a child with psychosocial disability, he has right to live as a full member of a family, community and society. It is the obligation of the government and the donors, whose agenda is inclusion, to invest in removing physical, cultural, economic, civil, communication, mobility and attitudinal barriers that destroy the rights of children like Prabin to be a member of society. 

If you want to provide any support to Prabin, contact 00977-1-4427200, Nepal Mental Health Foundation, or write to the author at jagannathlc@gmail.com

Source : E Kantipur , 14th June 2013