The Maharashtra Sewa Samiti, an non-governmental organisation (NGO) based in Alberta, Canada, has agreed to fund the rehabilitation centre.

National Institute of Mental Health & Neurological Sciences, Bangalore, is the only institution that has such a facility in the country. Speaking to The Indian Express, chairperson of the Institute for Psychologically Handicapped (IPH) Dr Anand Nadkarni said, "We have been promised a sum of Canadian $ 20,000 and we are in the process of getting all the paperwork done for the same." IPH has pioneered preventive community psychiatry in the country and runs a successful programme in Thane district.

According to Dr Nadkarni, schizophrenia is one of the mostmisunderstood disorders. "It is marked by major dysfunctions of thinking, emotion and behaviour. Disturbances in thinking take the form of illogicality, numerous faulty associative interferences and delusional beliefs," explained Dr Nadkarni who added, "Perception is also disturbed with hallucinations."

According to him, "Motor behaviour can be faulty and bizarre and social relationships are minimal as withdrawal from others is the more characteristic pattern." He explained that rapid advances in pharmaco-therapy had led to the possibility of total control of schizophrenia. "With improved prognosis we have patients who recover but still have to re-learn skills needed to deal with the real world," Dr Nadkarni says. He stresses on the need for a common platform for care-givers and recovering patients so that a network of self-help groups can be formed.

It was with this end in view that IPH had organised the first conference for care givers following which therapeutic groups were formed. However, DrNadkarni admits, "We made a mistake. Since the dependency levels were high the groups could not sustain themselves."

When the next conference was held in May 1998, these aspects were kept in mind and a group of 100 care-givers was formed. "We plan to have a similar conference in Thane on Sunday (February 28) so that a similar group can come into being here too," Dr Nadkarni said. The conference will be held at the Sahyog Mandir in Thane and will be inaugurated by well-known psychiatrist and actor Dr Mohan Agashe.