Give equal opportunity to people with special needs to mingle with general participants and vice versa; let us give access to all at a museum. ‘Museums of Ahmedabad’ (MoA) program is vibrant to organise activities intended for people with special needs, not just in Ahmedabad but across India. MoA founder Ms Avani Varia specially curated a walk for IHWF2020 ‘Inclusive experience at a Museum – Walk, interaction and Charkha’ to break barriers for special needs people. The walk is designed keeping in mind the needs of a group of people from Mook Badhir Mandal, Vadodara to participate along with general participants.
‘Kindness is the language the deaf can hear and the blind can see’ with this slogan the Mook Badhir Mandal (Deaf Association of Vadodara) was founded in 1972 to bridge the gap between the hearing-impaired community and the mainstream society.
The Baroda Museum and Picture Gallery was founded by Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad of Vadodara, and is located within the vicinity of the Sayaji Baug. The ground floor level section has European and Indian art collections, Islamic room with old Koran's, Egyptian room with a mummy in a sarcophagus. The first or the upper level has sections full of Taxidermy animals and reptiles kept in formalin bottles and minerals found all over the globe. The basement level has skeletons of different animals and humans. They have a 71 foot long blue whale skeleton; this museum is a great place to get the children on a field trip, lots to learn.
Participants will take a walk of Baroda Museum & Picture Gallery, the explanations for deaf-mute to be facilitated with sign-language; enabling insight to general participants how special-need group converse, this will end with exchange of experiences amongst both groups. The walk to be concluded with all the participants will get hands-on experience to learn a traditional hand-skill of handspinning of cotton yarn on a traditional Box Charkha which is made possible by Chalo Charkho Ramiye - the contemporary charkha movement of India.
