NGO sets up makeshift clinic for mentally-ill

Patients queue up outside Aashray Adhikar Abhiyan's makeshift clinic in the Jama Masjid area.

Coming as a ray of hope for the destitute mentally-ill people in the national capital, an NGO, Aashray Adhikar Abhiyan, has set up a makeshift clinic to help these homeless people. Armed with doctors and psychiatric help, they set up their clinic in Urdu Park, Jama Masjid twice a week.

The NGO’s psychiatrist and psychologist attend to a line of patients who are mostly rickshaw pullers, vendors, rag pickers and beggars.

Paramjeet Kaur, the director of the NGO and head of the Urdu Park Project, told this newspaper that their mission is to help the mentally ill, meet patients and hand out free medicine. “Our goal is to make their lives better. Our team gets patients with both severe as well as routine mental illnesses. We help out patients with bi-polar disorder, drug addictions and schizophrenia as well,” she said, adding, “These homeless and poor people at the bottom of the social set up have legal right to health, but they are unable to access it. So our set up is a one-stop-clinic for the poor people.”

The NGO covers the costs of treatment and also provides clothes and food to the patients. The organisation has also trained workers to observe behavioural patterns and follow up with the patients.

With very little focus from both the Central and the local government on mental illnesses, there is a vacuum of trained staff to help the people in this area. There is a clear shortage of professionals and social workers who are professionally trained to work towards mental health issues.

Aashray Adhikar Abhiyan was started more than ten years ago to help the homeless people, but today it is also known for its efforts to help the mentally ill. The Delhi-based NGO has established various street clinics in the past years. Since 2008, more than a thousand mentally ill patients have been referred to the street clinics. For the Urdu Park project, it has teamed up with medical specialists from the Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Science (IHBAS).