Preethi Srinivasan is an Indian disability rights activist, motivational speaker and former sportsperson. She is the founder of Soulfree, a charitable trust that works for the welfare and empowerment of persons with severe disabilities, particularly women living with quadriplegia and paraplegia in India.
| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| Name | Preethi Srinivasan |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Known for | Disability rights advocacy; founder of Soulfree |
| Earlier career | Cricketer; captained the Tamil Nadu under-19 women's team |
| Organisation | Soulfree (charitable trust) |
| Cause of disability | Spinal cord injury sustained in 1998 |
Born in Tamil Nadu, Preethi Srinivasan was an accomplished young athlete and student. She represented Tamil Nadu in cricket at the youth level and is reported to have captained the state's under-19 women's cricket team. She was also active in swimming during her school years.
In 1998, while on a trip with friends, Srinivasan suffered a spinal cord injury in a swimming accident at the age of eighteen. The injury left her paralysed from the neck down. In the years that followed, she lived with quadriplegia and was cared for primarily by her parents at their home in Tamil Nadu.
Drawing on her own experience of long-term disability and the limited support systems available to people with severe spinal injuries in India, Srinivasan founded the trust Soulfree. The organisation focuses on:
Srinivasan is a regular speaker at conferences, educational institutions and public forums on themes of resilience, disability inclusion and mental health. She writes and speaks in English and Tamil, and her story has been featured in Indian print media, television and digital platforms as part of broader conversations on disability in India.
She has been recognised in various public listings of inspiring Indian women and disability advocates, and her work through Soulfree has drawn attention to the gap in institutional care for adults with severe disabilities in India, an area that remains under-served by both government schemes and private healthcare.
Preethi Srinivasan's life and advocacy highlight several issues at the intersection of sport, gender and disability in India: the vulnerability of young athletes to catastrophic injury, the burden of long-term care that falls on families in the absence of state-supported facilities, and the need for stronger legal and social frameworks under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016.