The episode of Aashitaru, hosted by RJ Padma, features Natesh. He works for Carers Worldwide and, in this interaction, speaks about caregivers. Caregivers are people who help the disabled in their everyday routine work. This community’s concerns are often ignored as the conversation usually revolves around the disabled persons themselves, and not around the people taking care of them. “We work with caregivers in the Koppala district of Karnataka, Karnool and Ananthapur districts of Andhra Pradesh, Hazaribagh district of Jharkhand, and Koraput district of Odisha,” mentions Natesh.

Today, there exists a law for caregivers, passed in 2016, which provides a definition of ‘caregivers’ and the people who can be considered so. “Most of these caregivers are unpaid providers. They face a lot of problems and they need to be talked about,” says Natesh.

The caregivers need to be mentally and physically healthy themselves to be able to take care of disabled patients. They work hard all day long and often suffer deep physical and emotional stress which they cannot share with anyone. They may not even have anyone’s support in the family to help take care of the patient.

 
Through the platform of Carers Worldwide, caregivers can now come together, talk about their problems, find solutions and learn ways to make time for leisure. They can also make use of this state-level platform to take their voices to the government.

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