Dr Aslam Azad has come to terms with his pain. Hailing from a poor family of Sujawal (a small village of the southern coastal part of Thatta district), Azad completed MBBS from the Liaquat Medical College Jamshoro.
Besides, being the editor of a magazine, a correspondent for two newspapers and the founding member of Jamshoro Press Club, he played an active role in political and social movements of his time. After completing his studies, he organising various medical camps for the poor people of the neglected Thatta district.
However, he had an accident while returning from a medical camp on December 20, 1991, and spinal cord was damaged.
He went through a number of surgeries and spent almost a year at the Aga Khan University Hospital, but the doctors were unable to treat him and declared him quadriplegic.
“I started adjusting to the everyday difficulties of life. … I cannot fight my disability, but I have accepted it. This has given me power, the power to fight with pain,” he says.
Azad has involved himself in various activities; he offers free tuitions to the students of his village, free medical services to patients and he is an active member of various nongovernmental organisations working in his town for the betterment of the poor people of Sindh. He is currently working on his autobiography and poetry. Various politicians, intellectuals, poets, journalist and friends visit him frequently.
He says, “Accept the world with a smile. Your tragedies and difficulties are an integral part of life, so make sure you accept them with smile.”
Despite his disability, he is an asset for the students who come to him for free tuitions, the patients who seek his assistance, his family which is together because of him and his friends who depend on him for the decisions in their lives.
The accident in 1991 broke his body but was unable to break his spirit. He is a man of courage and power.
An unbreakable spirit prevails over pain
