Around 20 members of the National Federation of the Blind, Tamil Nadu
western sub branch in the city, gave a petition to district collector
Archana Patnaik on Monday, complaining that they have not received old
age pensions (OAP) for the past three months. Patnaik assured them that
OAP (Rs 1,000 every month) would hereafter be disbursed on time.
The complainants also added that the rights of persons with disabilities
bill introduced by the Union government would only created further
hassles for disabled persons. They demanded an amendment to the bill.
"If the Union government did not amend the bill, we would campaign
against the Congress and its allies in the upcoming Lok Sabha election,"
said P Manoharan, project director, Southern India for National
Federation of the Blind. He added that the organisation has 50,000
members across the country and Tamil Nadu alone has at least 7,000.
Initially, Union government had provided for age relaxation of 10
years for disabled persons in education and jobs. But the new bill
reduced is to five years. A national commission for disabled persons has
been mooted. "The Union government should keep the age relaxation at 10
and should appoint a disabled person as commissioner for the national
commission for disabled people," said Manoharan.
He added that
the bill provides five per cent reservation for disabled persons in
public sector jobs whereas their organisation had demanded six per cent.
"One per cent of reservation should be given to blind people and another one per cent to low vision people," said Manoharan.
Source : TOI , 11th feb 2014
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