The Rickshaw Project

The Rickshaw Project (TRP) is an advocacy platform that works for people with disabilities through a dial-a-rickshaw service.[1] It is the brainchild of Network of Organization Working for People with Disability, Pakistan (NOWPDP) and it aims to empower PWDs via employment and demonstrating inclusion in action.[2] NOWPDP is an initiative of Aga Khan National Council. Its objective is to create a highly visible, “moving” platform for advocating issues regarding the rights of persons with disabilities and promoting inclusive societies by example. Zulqurnain Asghar, South Asia’s first visually impaired clinically psychologist [3] heads the Rickshaw Project.

How it Works?

Customers can book the rickshaw online or can call the customer services centre and a rickshaw will take them to their desired destination. Not only the rickshaws are driven by trained PWDs, but it also follows a standardized billing system.

Advocacy, Awareness-Raising & Sensitization

The Rickshaw Project was born as a reaction. It is a project not just intended to create employment opportunities for people with disabilities, but also to establish a platform through which the unequal treatment and negative social perceptions of people with disabilities can be challenged and ultimately changed via Advocacy, Awareness-Raising & Sensitization.[4] By creating a moving, functioning example of mainstreaming people with disabilities, they will not only be integrated into mainstream society through employment, but PWDs will emerge as leaders in this process of challenge and change.

The Rickshaw Project also conducts awareness raising and sensitization sessions for corporates and educational institutions. These sessions are aimed towards facilitating a dialogues and interaction, where we enable mainstream society and people with disabilities to shift their perspective from sympathy to empathy; from charity to social justice; and from apathy to action.

References

External links