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“Since March I have already learnt 700 words in Indian Sign Language. My mother is also attending classes”

When we spoke to Raktima’s family in Chandigarh last week they told us she was busy decorating the house for Diwali by hanging colourful paper cutouts everywhere. In college she had also entered a diya-making contest. Raktima (19), who is deaf-mute, has always been fonder of the arts than other subjects. Besides, in the mainstream school she attended, she was simply memorising her lessons and “doing copy-paste” without understanding the meaning, says her father Santosh Kumar, who is in the Indian Air Force. Learning Indian Sign Language (ISL) has closed the gap between vision and comprehension and opened up new vistas, not only for her but also for her family.
 
What a pity Raktima could not convey to her parents what she was suffering in school! She did not want to continue studying after Class 8 and could not make them understand why. Only recently, after ISL entered their lives, did Santosh and his wife Rupa Singh come to know that the teachers used to be rude to her and punish her by making her stand outside class – and this despite the couple having repeatedly told them not to stress her out and that “even if she gets 40 per cent we are okay with it”.
 
The instinctive reaction of most parents with Deaf children is to adapt them to a hearing world: they must learn to speak, and if this fails, get a cochlear implant so they can attend a ‘normal’ school. Santosh and Rupa followed this pattern. When Raktima was a year old Rupa once noticed that when a heavy object fell near the sleeping baby she did not flinch. She observed her more closely and told Santosh she suspected their daughter could not hear. After first dismissing her fears he too began to take note. The baby didn’t respond when he dropped a glass next to her or raised the volume of the TV. She was one-and-a-half when the doctor in Amla, Madhya Pradesh, where Santosh was posted, told them to do a BERA test – the Brainstem Evoked Response Audiometry hearing examination performed on children.
 
Once Raktima’s deafness was confirmed the couple applied for a cochlear implant under the government’s ADIP scheme that provides monetary assistance for the purchase and fitting of aids and appliances for the disabled. Meanwhile, Raktima had developed her own sign language which she used to communicate with her parents, her older brother Siddharth Ranjan, younger sister Navpreeti and grandmother Saraswati Devi. She foiled all attempts to make her talk.
 
Santosh was transferred from Amla to New Delhi where he was posted at the Air Force Records Office. He reapplied for the cochlear implant and had to wait many years for it to be sanctioned. Raktima was fitted with a hearing aid and underwent four years of speech therapy at the Army Hospital in Delhi and two years at the Command Hospital in Pune before being fitted with the implant at the Army Hospital. “But by then she was 12 years old and the human brain completes most of its development by the age of 6,” says Santosh, explaining why, despite her ability to hear sounds, her comprehension lagged behind. Admitting her to a mainstream school, as the doctor recommended, was no magical solution.
 
In March this year Raktima, besides doing her diploma in Fine Arts, started attending classes in ISL. It has caused a sea change in her life. She is thrilled at being able to meaningfully communicate with others; her teachers say she will show excellent progress in two years. Rupa too is learning ISL in the same class and teaching the rest of the family when they get home. “She used to become angry when she was unable to communicate but now she is able to share her thoughts and is happy,” says Rupa. “I am able to truly get to know her. Thanks to sign language it’s as if I’ve found my daughter again.”
 
Navpreeti is in Class 9, Siddharth is in Kanpur training to be a commercial pilot and Raktima intends to do her bachelors in Fine Arts. Santosh proudly says that after entering a Para Yoga competition Raktima won a gold medal in Chandigarh and was ranked among the top 8 in the country! He narrates how he came up with her name: “When she was born Colonel Ganguly told me your daughter is so beautiful, she looks like a ratn (gem), hence I named her Raktima.”
 
The couple’s only goal for her is that she should be financially independent and able to take care of all her needs. And with continued love and support, this gem is going to shine even brighter in the days to come.