Logo of Everyone is good at something

koushalya

koushalya
swain , odisha

Koushalya Swain in yellowish orange kameez and purple salwar sits holding an upright thick wooden stick. To the left is an old wooden cot. The wall behind her is made of pieces of tattered cloth stitched together.
Koushalya sits cross-legged on a cot covered with a sheet in a blue and green pattern. A heap of silk-cotton lies on a circular tray next to her. She holds a bunch of cotton in her left hand and with her right hand she is drawing out a thread.
Koushalya in green kameez and purple salwar is squatting outdoors in front of a chulha (earthen stove). She is putting straw into the open mouth of the chulha with her left hand and her right hand holds a steel spatula. An aluminium pot and a kadhai (wok) sit on top of the stove.
Koushalya sits on the stone ledge that skirts her house. One leg is crossed beneath her and the other is dangling to the ground. She is cutting vegetables with a knife. The outer wall of the house is plastered with mud.
Koushalya poses with members of her family. Sitting cross-legged on the floor is her nephew Kanha Swain (14). Koushalya is seated in between her mother Puni Swain (71) and sister Tunamani Swain (28). Kanha is in a full-sleeved light blue T-shirt and dark trousers. Puni wears a purple sari with her head covered by the pallu. Koushalya wears an orange kameez and purple salwar. Tunamani wears a red and cream kameez and black churidar.
Icon to view photos in full screen

“We have to support one another in these testing times”

Readers often tell us that the EGS campaign brings them hope. But we cannot guarantee uplifting stories always. A PwD’s life might have taken a sudden turn for the worse before we met them. And that was the case with Koushalya Swain (35) from Puri, Odisha. COVID-19 had recently taken the life of her elder brother, her parents’ only son.
 
Koushalya’s septuagenarian parents were devastated by the tragedy; her mother barely speaks these days and her father, a daily wage labourer, is growing weaker by the day. Her sister-in-law is in a state of perpetual tension, wondering how to meet the expenses for her two school-going children. The family, which includes her unmarried sister, gets by on ration rice, milk from their cow, and the government allowance for BPL (below poverty line) families.
 
It is as though the lynchpin of their lives has been struck down. Koushalya says she used to make cotton wicks and sell them at the Puri Jagannath temple. “My brother used to take me by bus. But now I have no money to buy tickets.” The pall of gloom that has descended over the household has brought her spirits down to an all-time low. “I don’t like to sit at home because I only see the pain and worry on everyone’s faces,” she says. “So I roam around or go sit with friends for some time.”
 
Born with an impairment of her leg, she used to crawl and drag herself around till she was 12 or 13. Then an aunt of hers, who is no more, encouraged her to try to walk. She brought her a stick that she had fashioned and helped her use it. “My brother used to drop me to school. I stopped studying after I failed 10th standard.” At home she helps her sister-in-law with the daily chores, cutting vegetables or tending to the chulha (earthen stove).
 
Rakesh Kumar Pradhan of Jogamaya Charitable Trust (JCT), Bhubhaneswar is trying to help the family get compensation for losses they suffered during the extremely severe cyclone Fani of 2019. But what JCT cannot do for Koushalya is something she has to do herself: shake off her feeling of hopelessness and muster up the courage to face the future.


Photos:

Vicky Roy

©Copyrights - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/