Aakash Chiripal: A reel that changed life

Aakash was very close to his grandmother when she died. He was depressed and ceased to talk. We tried many different things but it was really difficult for us to bring him back. We didn’t know how to make him smile again. He used to sit in the corner of a room and miss his grandmother for days at stretch.

Once I was randomly scrolling my Instagram reels and he was watching it. When he saw SiddharthBatra’s reel he smiled and it clicked him. He liked it so much that he wanted to make reels like him so we made recreational reels. Last year around March I made an Instagram account for him where we posted his reels. Sluggishly people started liking it and followed us. They were amazed that a down syndrome boy was able to do this. He received a lot of appreciation but with good follows the bad.

There were people who started commenting, “ye to pagalhai, isepagalkhanabhejoyahakyakarrahahai.” I ignored them for a while but when things got out of hand I chose to go the legal way to shut them up.

We started posting more and more the recreational reels of SiddharthBatra that he made and after a while, SiddharthBatra started resharing it and finally it made my little boy smile. There were times when he used to make 2-3 reels in a day and sometimes none at all. It makes me very happy to see him smile like before. He never gets tired of making reels, eating chocolates, and going shopping these days.  From a child who chose to stay quiet after his grandmother’s demise to a child who is delighted following Instagram trends, is a journey filled with love and pain but feels worth it when I see him smile.