I am thousand struggles old: Arockiadass

A story of a differently-abled person based in Chennai who overcame personal challenges and emerged a community leader.

Arockiadass had a disabled companion even as a foetus. In fact it was in that companion's womb he grew. His mother herself was disabled. She died at such an early stage that Arockiadass does not remember her well.

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Adopted by his aged grandmother who was a coolie, he went to school, although with lots of difficulty. But with sponsorship from various sources he studied up to 9th standard after shuttling from one school to another. In fact that was his last stint with education.

They were living in a house (to call it a house is a gross overstatement) with a caved-in floor and half-open roof. Unable to move because of his severe disability and nobody offering him any assistance he lay desolate in that ruined house.

He never had big dream, perhaps because he could hardly sleep well in that house. He just wanted to live. He wanted to live because the poignancy of life cruelly teased him to wait to see the result of the struggles into which it drew him every now and then. Arokiadass does not measure the length of life by the birthdays that have passed by. He remembers it by the number of struggles he has lived through.