Jaipur Limb users have demonstrated their sporting ability at AIDEX 2026, Sri Lanka’s long-running sports festival for people with disabilities.
Images published by the Daily Mirror showed prosthetic users in action during the event, which was held on September 20 at the Rifle Green Grounds of the Sri Lanka Air Force Headquarters in Colombo.
Organised by the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society, AIDEX—Aid to the Ex-Abled—brings together people with amputations, congenital limb differences and other disabilities from across Sri Lanka.
Around 450 athletes had been expected to participate in the 2026 festival, including civilians, military veterans who experienced limb loss during service and children born with limb differences.
The programme included more than 60 sporting events, with competitors participating in track and field, cycling, long jump, discus, shot put, archery and wheelchair races. Events were arranged across different age groups, allowing children, adults and veteran athletes to participate.
More than a prosthetic fitting outcome
AIDEX was first held in 1991 as part of the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society’s rehabilitation programme for people fitted with Jaipur Limb prostheses. It has subsequently developed into one of Sri Lanka’s most established disability sporting events.
The festival demonstrates an aspect of prosthetic rehabilitation that cannot be captured solely through the number of devices fitted. A prosthesis may enable standing and walking, but the broader objective is participation—returning to education, employment, family responsibilities, recreation and community life.
Sport gives prosthetic users an opportunity to test balance, confidence, endurance and control in a supportive environment. It may also reveal functional issues that are less obvious during a conventional clinic appointment, such as socket movement during faster activity, instability on turns or difficulty managing uneven ground.
Participation in AIDEX should not be interpreted as a formal clinical evaluation of a particular prosthesis. However, the sight of Jaipur Limb users running, cycling, throwing and competing offers a visible reminder that successful rehabilitation extends beyond basic mobility.
Four decades of Jaipur Limb provision in Sri Lanka
The Colombo Friend-in-Need Society has provided Jaipur Limb prostheses without charge in Sri Lanka since 1984. According to reporting ahead of AIDEX 2026, the organisation has supported more than 40,000 people with amputations through its limb-fitting and rehabilitation programme.
The Jaipur Foot was originally developed in India as an affordable prosthetic foot appropriate for local lifestyles and lower-resource settings. Its design supports activities such as barefoot walking, squatting and sitting cross-legged, while its water resistance can be valuable for people working in agriculture or travelling across wet and uneven terrain.
The technology has also been used extensively in humanitarian and post-conflict programmes. In Sri Lanka, Jaipur Foot services have supported both civilians and former members of the armed forces, including people who experienced limb loss during the country’s civil war.
India’s Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang Sahayata Samiti has conducted a series of artificial-limb camps in Sri Lanka. By 2024, four earlier camps had supported more than 3,100 people, including over 2,200 recipients of Jaipur Foot prostheses.
The continuation of local services through the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society has helped move the programme beyond temporary fitting camps towards longer-term access to fabrication, adjustment and rehabilitation.
Sport challenges assumptions about disability
AIDEX also serves a wider social purpose. Competitive sport places participants in the role of athletes rather than defining them by a diagnosis, amputation or device.
Professor A. H. Sheriffdeen, patron of the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society, described the festival as a celebration of ability and an opportunity to show what athletes can accomplish.
That visibility is important. People with limb loss can continue to encounter assumptions that they are unable to work, play sport or participate independently in community life. Events such as AIDEX challenge those attitudes through performance rather than explanation.
They also create opportunities for prosthetic users to meet others with similar experiences. For children and recent amputees, seeing experienced users compete can provide practical peer support and a clearer picture of what may be possible after rehabilitation.
Support beyond the sports field
AIDEX 2026 was supported by Dilmah’s MJF Charitable Foundation, which has been associated with the festival since it began.
The foundation’s support extends beyond the annual sporting event. It reportedly provides an average of 75 educational scholarships each year to children from the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society community who have amputations or limb differences.
Through its Small Entrepreneur Programme, the foundation has also provided equipment and business grants to 128 people with disabilities since 2012. These initiatives recognise that mobility is connected to wider questions of education, income and social participation.
A prosthesis can provide the physical means to move, but long-term inclusion also depends on accessible schools, employment opportunities, transport, appropriate healthcare and public attitudes.
AIDEX brings these themes together on the sports field. For one day, Jaipur Limb users are not presented merely as recipients of rehabilitation services. They are cyclists, runners, throwers, archers and competitors demonstrating what effective rehabilitation can help make possible.
- Daily Mirror: Jaipur Limb Users in Action
- The Morning: AIDEX 2026 Sports Festival
- Colombo Friend-in-Need Society
- MJF Charitable Foundation
- Daily Mirror: 32nd Annual AIDEX Sports Festival