Dr. Kinjal Chandra is a Pediatric Occupational Therapist and Founder of Pehel Pediatric Therapy Centre, Mulund, Mumbai. It caters to children with Developmental Disabilities like Autism, Learning Disabilities, ADHD, Cerebral Palsy, Down’s syndrome, etc. At a very young age of 25 years since she started working clinically in various hospitals, NGO’s and clinics around Mumbai she came across the harsh reality that these kids and parents were going through about poor awareness and acceptance in the society and schools. She realized that she wasn’t really bringing about a difference in their lives just by treating them sitting in the air conditioned clinic. Getting out and about in the society and bringing about a mind shift was the need of the hour. She founded her own clinic Pehel Pediatric Therapy Centre and started a small, self determined fight to bring about a real change in the way in which these kids were perceived by the society. Since then she has been striving day and night to achieve this goal. She started taking lectures in many hospitals, NGO’s, schools for the parents and professionals which were appreciated by the media on many occasions. She conducted an awareness talk for Pediatricians of Grant Govt. Medical College and Sir J.J group of hospitals, Mumbai (26th Sept 2013). Post that she addressed around 110 Pediatricians, Psychologists, Speech Therapists, Occupational Therapist from all over Mumbai on awareness of developmental disabilities as a Faculty held at J.J Hospital, Mumbai (5th Feb 2014).
She worked in a NGO - Association for the Welfare of Persons with a Mental Handicap (AWMH), Maharashtra and trained special educators and provided therapy at the lowest cost to children from the slums in and around Mumbai. She also gave a talk at Catholic Health Association of India and addressed many Nurses, Special educators and Social workers on issues of Developmental Disabilities and their management (14th Oct 2014).
Along with this she also ventured into spreading awareness into rural areas of Maharashtra and Gujarat. She conducted a awareness Workshop on Learning Disability at Caramel School for the mentally handicap at Sawangi- Meghe, a village in Wardha, Maharashtra addressing many special educators and social workers on identification in management of Learning Disability, Autism & Behavioral Disorders in kids (13th Nov 2014). She was also a part of the medical team at a camp conducted at villages like Bhuj and Naliya in Kutch, Gujarat where kids and adults were screened and treated (27-29th Dec 2008). She also gave a talk addressing hundreds of parents and special educators from villages like Nashik, Sangamner, Shreerampur and Kopargaon for a “ Awareness Cum Sensitization program for parents of special children and educators “ organized by Savali Palak Sangh, Pune on behalf of NATIONAL TRUST, New Delhi by Department of Empowerment of person with disabilities, Government of India (1st Nov 2015).
She also provides lectures at local community organizations like Shree Mulund KVO Samaj where she conducted a parental workshop for hundreds of parents (15th June 2014). She gives awareness lectures every year addressing parents of Bhanushali community (29th Oct 2013 & 22nd Feb 2015). She was invited as a guest lecturer to address students of Dr. Bhanuben Nanavati Career Development Centre to speak on Learning Disability and its management (29th Oct 2014). Alongside she also conducted numerous awareness lectures on Developmental disabilities at various schools like Jnan Sarita High School, Mulund (27th Sept 2015); Adarsh vidhyalaya, Mulund (1st Oct 2015); S.M.P.R High school, Mulund (4th Oct 2015); CAD Pre-school, Mulund (17th Oct 2014); Rainbow Pre-school, Mulund (4th Oct 2015); St. Lawrence High school, Thane (5th Nov 2015); Chitter chatter Pre-school, Mulund (28th Oct 2015); addressing teachers about early identification, awareness, acceptance, management and mainstreaming of children with Developmental disabilities. She along with Rotaract Club of Mumbai Mulund South conducted “ NADAAN PARINDEY – An Autism and Learning Disability Initiative” wherein they performed a street play at railway stations and public gardens spreading awareness directly amongst public about these disabilities (5th Sept 2015). She also writes articles in Police Prabhav newspaper dedicated to the police fraternity of Mumbai about awareness of these Developmental Disabilities (3rd Oct 2015). Even at her clinic she conducts various workshops for parents of kids with Developmental Disabilities addressing their physical, dental, educational and medical needs by different resource persons for an overall care of their children.
Her work was appreciated on an online blog “Scrollthrough” for her work towards children with learning disability and other Special needs (8th Oct 2015).
Link - http://scrl.in/1MgkOrT
On many occasions she had been into local newspapers like GURJARMAT (9th Sept 2015), ARASPARAS (14th Sept 2015), MULUND NEWS (28th Oct 2014 & 15th Sept 2015), LOKMAT WARDHA (13th Nov 2014), LOKAMAT AHEMADNAGAR (2nd Nov 2015), Police Prabhav (3rd Oct 2015). Along with this the street play was also covered by a local news channel HOME NEWS (8th Sept 2015) which was telecasted many times. She has indeed spread the awareness about these issues at various levels in urban and rural society.
Also find attached proof of the newspaper clippings and other related documents in PDF format.
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