ISLAMABAD (APP) - Directorate General of Special Education (DGSE) is striving to mitigate the sufferings of Persons With Disabilities (PWDs) and making efforts to bring them into the mainstream. Director General DGSE Khalid Naeem talking to APP said the directorate is rendering services to people with disabilities that include provision of personal aids and appliances, specialized services for hearing assessment, language development, speech therapy, physiotherapy, Braille and mobility training, training in arts and crafts and model library facilities. DGSE through its current resources is working to provide quality education facilities besides promotion of sports and other recreational facilities to the handicapped, he said. According to national census 1998, the director said there were a total of four million people with disabilities which is 2.49 per cent in Pakistan while according to the estimates of World Health Organisation (WHO), such estimate was seven per cent of the whole population which means ten million people. Among these disabled there were 8.60 per cent visually handicapped, 7.40 per cent with hearing impaired, 19 per cent physically handicapped, 14 per cent mentally handicapped while 8.21 per cent were having more than on disability and 43.33 per cent were having other such disabilities. Thus each set of them required separate facilities for rehabilitation. There were about 0.4 million disabled children in Pakistan for whom the total number of government and non-government institutions was 530 with 30,000 enrolment which is 4 per cent of their population. The Directorate also monitors and evaluate different programs launched for the welfare and rehabilitation of the people with disabilities, promote sports and recreational activities for these people, and make arrangement of Braille books. While promoting the concept of inclusive education, where people with disabilities are enabled to study with able bodied students, Khalid Naeem said that DGSE has also helped established special education departments for study up to M.Phil and Ph.D in Allama Iqbal Open University, Karachi and Punjab Universities.