Disability News and Advocacy in India

The National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP) on January 26 sent an application to the ministry of personnel, public grievances and pensions complaining of discrimination faced by them.

The letter appealed that the Union Service Public Commission (UPSC) which has different norms for the number of attempts allowed to disabled category candidates for appearing in the Civil Services exams needs to be revised immediately.

While candidates belonging to SC/ST have unlimited number of attempts till the age of 35, and OBC candidates have seven attempts till the age of 33, disabled candidates are allowed no more than four attempts till the age of 40.

"We want the government to allow us more number of attempts like others. What is the point of age relaxation if we can’t appear for the exams due to restricted number of attempts?" says 33-year-old Sunil Kumar, a UPSC aspirant who has taken the Civil Services exams four times, and wants to make another attempt.

Another discrepancy which Kumar, who works with the Airport Authority of India, points is that although in January 2005 Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had ordered that three per cent reservation should be adhered in Civil Services for persons with disabilities, there are no reserved seats for top posts like the IAS and IPS (administrative).

Last year more than one lakh candidates appeared for the UPSC exam. Out of the total 422 seats, only two were taken in. "Constitutionally, the country accepted the logic of reservation as a means of providing a level playing field to bring marginalised sections at par with the mainstream. The three per cent reservation for disabled people should be seen within the same legislative logic. But as we have stressed, the extension of age limit sans the increased number of attempts, entitled to other reserved categories, is subversion of that logic," says Parvinder Singh, senior project coordinator, communication, NCPEDP.

Singh further says that the UPSC should assess the disabled keeping in mind their access to books and coaching centres.

"The logic of merit cannot be used to deny entry to disabled people, as lack of access to education and other facilities place disabled people at the greatest disadvantage. Can you imagine a wheelchair user from a lower-middle class background coming to Delhi, renting an accessible place and commuting on DTC buses to get to coaching classes?" says Singh.

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 7:59 AM  1 Comments

The New Year celebrations have not died out completely but the haze has settled. But some times you need the apparent clarity to give way to a fuzzy obscurity to find new ideas and break free, at least momentarily, from the staid and politically sound focus.

I have been a full-timer in the disability sector for about seven months now and I am just about beginning to realize how deeply and widely spread the mainstream view is, well that is why it is called the mainstream. The point I wish to make is that the process of looking at the world upside down can leave one with some very fascinating and troubling insights. This has begun to happen. As most of my peers and seniors in the disability sector would realize sooner rather than later, the need for creating consciousness and political opinion may serve the vital purpose of forcing this country's able-body polity and its policy makers into accepting disabled as equal participants in theory, but a change in the mindset of people around us will at best be superficially receptive. I am afraid there is an immense focus in blending in and whenever possible take the share of morally correct stand that is devoid of all ambiguity.

The hardcore and cold business of advocacy must go on. It has made us a political entity in this nation. We are more than a warning to the sinners and a motivation for the non-believers. We are people who have been out of vision and focus of this society's collective memories. The outcasts who never managed to influence an activity of the collective in realm of polity, economy and art.

It is scary as one almost feels like a ghost.

What I wanted to say in the very first place is that we must experiment with this space as a platform for sharing the personalized view of a disabled negotiating himself or herself and the others.

I have attempted a beginning will it move any further than this.

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 10:06 AM  0 Comments

On the morning of 8th October 2005, a devastating earthquake struck the Kashmir region, measuring 7.6 on Richter scale with its epicentre near Muzzafarabad in Pakistan administrated Kashmir. It, however, took a while for both India and Pakistan to wake up to the scale of destruction that the quake had unleashed. Two week since, the quake has left over 50,000 dead on Pakistani side and taken 1,300 lives on the Indian side. The toll is expected to rise substantially by the second wave of deaths with the onset of the region's notorious winter.

A team constituting Parvinder Singh, Senior Project Coordinator with N.C.P.E.D.P., Mukhtar Ahmad and Muzzamil Yakub, both from Helpline -- visited quake affected areas in Kashmir from 18th to 20th October to take a first hand stock of the status of rescue, relief and rehabilitation process with a specific focus on people with disabilities. The objective was to get disability included in the long-term rehabilitation plans being mooted by sensitising the State’s polity and the civil administration.

During the course of our visit, we also contacted Honourable Governor, Lt. General Shri S.K. Sinha; State Social Welfare Minister, Shri Mula Ram; and State Human Rights Commissioner, Justice A. Mir. We also spoke to several local officials, medical staff, doctors etc. and not to mention the quake-affected people.

It was a clear display of the Darwinian theory of the survival of the fittest, when it came to relief distribution, which for the most part was a hit-and-run drill of dumping relief material by NGOs, political parties and charitable trusts. This scene was apparent all along the National Highway No. 1/A from Baramulla onwards. Though there was plenty, the takers of the relief material distributed through this method, were ironically very limited in number. These were largely young boys who could slug it out in the jostling crowd. We saw this at least at a dozen points starting from the outskirts of Uri.

"There is a mad rush when relief is being distributed. People are desperate. My father is very old and I have five sisters. This makes me the only one in the family who can come out. My house has got destroyed completely and we have been camping in the open for past eleven days," he said.

According to an estimate, there are over a million people with disabilities in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. A large number of these people have been disabled due to incidents relating to mine explosions, shelling along the Line of Control and militancy related violence. In view of the above situation, the lack of attention that the civil administration and its officials displayed in terms of attending to people with disabilities took us by surprise.

A visit to hospitals in Baramulla, Uri and Srinagar revealed that the nature of injuries that were being reported clearly indicate that in the coming days there would be a big rise in number of disabled people in the valley, besides further complications in the existing disability cases.

"Three amputations have taken place so far (till 20th October). These include two men and one girl. They have been referred for surgery. In fact the girl’s amputation was done today itself," said Dr. Samina of Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences.

The valley has had a known prevalence of trauma cases since the time insurgency took root, and with the quake it is going to increase. We felt that the people need a greater engagement by the way of easy and accessible counselling, as short-term/temporary measures would not help.

The phase of rehabilitation in Kashmir is going to be as important as that of relief as the availability of a cover over the head would mean a difference between life and death.

The Army cannot become the sole manager of disaster management and the civil administration will have to wake up to its responsibility, opined many locals and NGO workers.

Following are the recommendations made by the team based on their visit:

3. Disabled friendly and Inclusive built environment, when reconstruction of shelters (temporary or permanent), schools, health centres, housing facilities, water and sanitation facilities, etc. takes place.

5. Disability should be a priority area for any policy that is being formulated for preparedness, mitigation & management and other efforts to prepare us to face similar challenges with confidence & competence in the future.

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 3:04 AM  0 Comments

A recent study conducted by the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP) has revealed that relief failed to reach people with disabilities in the earthquake-affected areas of Kashmir and that the State administration had not been sensitised to the needs of the differently-abled.

In an attempt to get the disabled included in the long-term rehabilitation plans of the Government, a team of NCPEDP visited the quake-affected areas for a first hand assessment of the rehabilitation process with special focus on people with disabilities.

According to the report that has been submitted to the Prime Minister, there was lack of communication and information among the various agencies involved in relief work.

While pointing out that the number of disabled persons in the State was likely to increase following the work, the report accuses the State Government of making no effort in integrating the disabled in the rehabilitation.

Recommending the collection of data on disabled people affected by the quake, the report suggests immediate convening of a meeting of civil society representatives and experts in the field of disability and asks for concrete and time bounds plans to address concerns in revival of livelihood.

The team also felt that the Government should enforce the Disability Act in the State and build disabled friendly shelters.

"It was a clear display of the Darwinian theory of the survival of the fittest. When it came to relief distribution, for the most part was a hit-and-run drill of dumping relief material by NGOs, political parties and charitable trusts. This scene was apparent all along the National Highway No. 1/A from Baramulla onwards,'' said Parvinder Singh, the senior project coordinator of the Kashmir visit. He further added that "though there was plenty, the takers of the relief material distributed through this method, were ironically very limited in number. These were largely young boys who could slug it out in the jostling crowd. We saw this at least at a dozen points starting from the outskirts of Uri.''

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 9:13 AM  0 Comments

When the killer Tsunami left the coasts and islands, after wreaking havoc, a subtext emerged from the human bodies that punctuated the landscape. Though death is a great leveler, the chances are if you are old or slow because of some disability it will take you first. But we cannot be fatalist to the extent of accepting this as a given.

Flip back to about a century when plagues and natural calamities took lives of millions. The calamities continue and so do outbreaks, but the story today is very different. The privileged will always escape with least amount of damage, and those on the margins will remain most vulnerable. People with disabilities were among the worst affected by the calamity and the number people with disabilities swelled further with numerous amputations and cases of mental trauma. These are all afterthoughts, nothing so tragic had happened to so many people at the same time in this country and despite most progressive future gazing a policy could not have been placed. But what about the future? Are we any wiser about what an emergency plan that takes into account people with disabilities?

Unfortunately, as is happening with most policies that are being churned out, the Government seems to be bent upon making people with disabilities re-live the tale of neglect, of being abandoned and then left out of rehabilitation polices.

I am referring to the Disaster Management Bill 2005, that became a necessity for the post-tsunami India, though it was long over due in a country that has floods, quakes and cyclones every year thanks to its sheer size. Incidentally, the Bill makes not even one mention of disabled or disability.

The Bill is being touted as a blueprint to provide for the effective management of disasters in country, but in its neglect of the vital lesson from the Tsunami about vulnerability of persons with disability the Bill nothing short of initiating a recipe of a policy disaster.

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 10:51 AM  0 Comments

A consultation was held by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment -- that deals with the subject of disability, with the name of Ministry only re-enforcing the charity approach -- past Thursday on Draft National Policy for Persons with Disabilities. It is difficult to imagine that a national policy for a marginal group being formulated in such a low key manner. Almost six decades into its existence as an independent nation, the least one would expect from an elected government is to make the process of policy formulation a little more representative by regional consultations or at least a substantial publicity by national and vernacular media. I suppose that will be asking for too much.

The Draft was sitting at the Ministry's website, open for public comment and responses that had to be initially given within 15 days of being posted.

This is shocking and makes one wonder, what is the profile of Indian Disability at least in the minds of policymakers in the Ministry? Well quite naturally, it is of an English speaking, net savvy phantom or imaginary group. How can they go so wrong, while knowing and acknowledging openly that they do not even have an accurate figure of people with disabilities. In this case it is safe to assume that policy was meant to be read by English speaking metro-based NGO activists – who are the wheelers and dealers of the handouts that are dubbed as rights. Incidentally, it this microscopic minority that has perfected the art of carrying the self-assumed status of guardians of a faceless and voiceless majority, and thus need to tackled.

Those treading the dusty streets of villages and small towns are unlikely to storm the national capital and give opinions.

Anyways, the members of disability sector too have to take the blame for competing to gain the proverbial place under the sun. Why did they not emphatically raise the issue of undemocratic and hurried process of formulating the Draft National Policy? Why did they not bring the house down demanding a clear statement detailing how the Draft was prepared in such secrecy? Why was it ambiguous on what model of disability was the Indian State going to officially adopt?

The Joint Secretary of the Ministry, Jayati Chandra, was at her best as master of ceremony skirting all possible criticisms aka setbacks. In her chatty style she announced that the sector has been consulted and more suggestion can be sent by September end, and after taking these into account a revised draft would be placed sometime in October end. She is moving on as a bureaucrat to another assignment, but what she has done or managed to pull off is no joke. National Policies are not drafted every year, and the voicesless and faceless members of disability sector will keep paying heavy price for this telegram of a policy.

# posted by Parvinder Singh : 8:48 AM  0 Comments