Lebenshilfe founder Dr T Saraswathi Devi passes away at 73

Visakhapatnam: Renowned special educationist and founder of Lebenshilfe Dr T Saraswathi Devi passed away here on Saturday. She was 73 and survived by her husband and two daughters.

She established the Lebenshilfe, an organisation for the mentally challenged. With a view to serve the mentally challenged, she established Lebenshilfe with 12 mentally challenged children in 1980 which is presently running with a total strength of over 500 children. Over 120 dedicated employees also working in the organisation.

She developed tiger dance, an old form of art of Andhra Pradesh into a therapy to control aggressiveness in the mentally challenged children. Pre-vocatinal training and many other techniques, which she had evolved and used had made these specially children stand tall.

She had travelled several countries and spoke at Lions Clubs, Rotary Clubs and other social organisations across the globe.

After her PG in political science, with two diplomas in theatre arts from Andhra University, Saraswathi Devi had obtained special education and did intensive study in-service training in the field of mental retardation from USA and Germany.

She had received over 1,000 awards at district, state, national and international level for her service to the mentally challenged.