Gharaunda-Group Home for Adults Scheme

What is the Gharaunda-Group Home for Adults Scheme?

Gharaunda-Group Home for Adults is a scheme of the National Trust for the Welfare of Persons with Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Mental Retardation and Multiple Disabilities, a statutory body set up under the National Trust Act, 1999. The Trust functions under the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (Divyangjan), Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.

According to the National Trust, Gharaunda addresses one of the deepest fears of parents of adults with disabilities: what happens to their child after the parents are gone. The scheme funds group homes that give adults with disabilities an assured home and a minimum quality of care for the rest of their lives, including basic medical care, vocational activity and daily support.

Gharaunda is a grant-in-aid scheme. The National Trust does not run the homes directly. Instead it registers eligible organisations, funds them to set up and operate a Gharaunda centre, and pays a monthly grant per resident. Families access the scheme by enrolling an adult with a disability into one of these registered centres.

Who is eligible for Gharaunda?

The scheme has two sets of eligibility conditions: one for the adult who will live in the home, and one for the organisation that runs it.

Adults who can be enrolled as residents:

• Must be 18 years of age or older.
• Must have one of the four disabilities covered by the National Trust Act, 1999 to autism, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability (mental retardation) or multiple disabilities — certified on a valid disability certificate.

Organisations that can run a centre (Registered Organisations):

• Must be registered with the National Trust.
• Must be a valid registered body under the applicable disability legislation.
• Must have at least two years of experience working with persons with disabilities, including at least one year in National Trust disabilities.
• Must own land or hold a lease of 10 years or more with a renewal provision.
• Must not be blacklisted by any government body.

Who cannot apply: an individual or family cannot apply to the National Trust for a personal cash grant under Gharaunda. There is no direct-benefit-transfer component paid to a resident's own bank account. Adults below 18 are not eligible for the adult group home, and organisations without National Trust registration cannot receive funding. Families who want home-based support for a minor or short-term relief should look at the Trust's other schemes such as Samarth (residential and respite care) or Disha (early intervention).

How much does Gharaunda provide?

According to the National Trust, funding to a registered organisation running a Gharaunda centre includes:

The National Trust funds residents in a 1:1 ratio, for every resident from a Low Income Group (including Below Poverty Line) family, one resident from above the LIG threshold is expected. This keeps centres financially balanced while ensuring poorer families are covered. Residents are also expected to be enrolled under Niramaya, the Trust's health insurance scheme, which reimburses up to Rs 1,00,000 a year in medical expenses.

What documents are required for Gharaunda enrolment?

How to apply for Gharaunda

For a family enrolling an adult into an existing centre:

1. Find a National Trust registered organisation running a Gharaunda centre near you. The list is available on the National Trust portal or from your district disability office.
2. Approach the centre and request an assessment of the adult with a disability. The centre conducts an assessment test to decide suitability.
3. Submit the enrolment form along with the disability certificate, proof of age, guardian ID and, where relevant, income or BPL and legal guardianship certificates.
4. Complete verification with the centre and collect the enrolment confirmation.

For an organisation seeking registration and funding:

1. Register your organisation with the National Trust and complete the online Gharaunda application form, paying the application fee of Rs 1,000.
2. Upload scanned supporting documents and post the printed form with documents to the National Trust within seven days.
3. Await the National Trust's response, generally within 15 days, followed by inspection and sanction.

Help and contact

• National Trust helpline: 011-43850700
• Website: nationaltrust.nic.in/gharaunda-scheme
• Registered organisations and district Divyangjan offices can also guide families to the nearest Gharaunda centre.

Gharaunda is best understood as an institutional care scheme rather than a cash-benefit scheme. Families should verify a centre's National Trust registration before enrolling, and there is no fee payable to any agent for "getting a name added" to a centre.

How to check your application status

Gharaunda does not have a single online applicant dashboard for families, because a family does not submit an individual application to the National Trust. What you track depends on which stage you are at.

If you are a family with an enrolment request pending at a centre:

1. Contact the Gharaunda centre directly. The centre, not the National Trust, holds your enrolment file and assessment result.
2. Ask specifically where the file stands: assessment scheduled, assessment completed and awaiting a vacancy, or enrolment confirmed.
3. If the centre is unresponsive for an unreasonable period, call the National Trust helpline at 011-43850700 and ask them to confirm the centre's registration status and to flag the delay. The Trust can act on a centre that is not processing enrolments properly, since it funds that centre.
4. Keep a copy of the enrolment form and any receipt or acknowledgement the centre gave you at submission; you will need the date and reference details to ask the Trust to trace it.

If you are an organisation with a registration or funding application pending with the National Trust:

1. The Trust states it typically responds within 15 days of receiving the posted hard copy with documents, followed by inspection and sanction. If that window has passed with no communication, call the helpline and quote your application date and the date you posted the physical documents.
2. Since the process requires both an online form and a posted hard copy within seven days, check first whether your hard copy actually reached the Trust, a common point where files stall is the physical copy never arriving or arriving incomplete.
3. Ask for the name of the officer or desk handling Gharaunda applications so you have a direct point of contact for follow-up rather than starting over with the general helpline each time.

There is no SMS or portal-based tracking number issued for Gharaunda enrolments at the family level; the helpline and the centre itself are the two channels that actually work.

Common reasons for rejection

Resident is under 18 years of age. Gharaunda is an adult scheme only. A minor with autism, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability or multiple disabilities cannot be enrolled here regardless of how severe the condition is. The fix is not to appeal, families in this situation should look at the National Trust's other schemes meant for children or short-term care, such as Disha or Samarth, and revisit Gharaunda once the child turns 18.

Disability certificate does not name one of the four covered conditions. Gharaunda only covers autism, cerebral palsy, intellectual disability (mental retardation) and multiple disabilities as defined under the National Trust Act, 1999. A certificate for a different disability, or a certificate that does not clearly state one of these four categories, will be rejected at the centre's assessment stage. The fix is to get the certificate reissued or clarified by the certifying medical authority to explicitly name the covered condition before resubmitting.

Enrolling family approaches a centre that is not National Trust registered. Some care homes market themselves informally as offering "Gharaunda-type" care without holding actual National Trust registration, which means no government grant is backing that placement and no protection exists if the centre shuts down. Before enrolling, confirm the centre's registration directly with the National Trust helpline rather than taking the centre's own word for it.

Centre has no vacancy against its sanctioned strength. A Gharaunda centre is sanctioned for a minimum of 20 and a maximum of 26 residents including the 30 percent buffer. If a centre is already at capacity, a new enrolment request is held or turned away regardless of how complete the paperwork is. The fix is to ask the centre for a waitlist position or to check with the National Trust for another registered centre nearby with an open slot.

Assessment finds the adult's care needs do not match the centre's stated model. Centres conduct their own assessment before enrolment, and some are geared toward residents needing lower support versus higher medical or behavioural support. A mismatch found at assessment is not a paperwork failure, it is a fit issue, and the practical fix is to seek a centre whose stated care model matches the resident's actual support needs.

Organisation's registration or funding application is rejected for gaps in eligibility. For organisations applying to run a centre, common rejection points are fewer than two years of documented experience working with persons with disabilities, no proof of land ownership or a lease of ten years or more with a renewal clause, or a prior blacklisting by any government department. Each of these needs to be resolved and documented, for example by securing a compliant long-term lease, before reapplying, rather than resubmitting the same file unchanged.

Incomplete physical documentation despite online form submission. Organisations must upload documents online and separately post the physical form with documents to the National Trust within seven days. Applications commonly stall or get treated as incomplete when this second, offline step is missed, delayed, or sent with pages missing. Sending the complete physical set promptly, and confirming its receipt by phone, avoids this.