Picture for representational purposes only.
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The spectacular judgement of the Supreme Court directing the Centre and the states to implement within three months the 18-year-old law mandating three per cent reservations for disabled persons was a badly needed intervention.
It exposes the shame of the government, which has done everything to scuttle the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act of 1955 that came into force in February 1996.
According to the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People, the actual implementation on an average is 0.4 per cent, with the employment of disabled in government organisations being just 0.5 per cent.
This means for every 1,000 disabled persons barely four got jobs. The disabled population, according to the UN and Planning Commission, could be around 10 per cent of India’s total population.
Ironically, the judgement was given on a petition filed by the Central government challenging the judgement of the Delhi high court which admitted the petition of the National Association of the Blind seeking implementation of the law.
It is shocking that the government used its enormous resources to fight the disabled. Perhaps Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should himself look into who was behind the decision to file the petition in the Supreme Court. The law minister should also be made answerable.
Even more unfortunate is the way the government sought to deprive the disabled — namely the blind or those with low vision, the hearing impaired and those with locomotor disability or cerebral palsy — of their rights under the law and the Constitution. The law also provided for identification of jobs that can be done by the disabled.
The government decided to play God and was presumptuous enough to declare only a few jobs that it felt the disabled could do. For instance, if there are 1,000 jobs they can do, the government list showed only 100 jobs, which cut down opportunities to a pittance.
It defied all logic and led to enormous injustices, according to Javed Abidi, founder of the Disability Rights Group. For instance, two people with slight limps who cleared the IAS exams were declared unfit because of their limp and it was only after strong protests and the intervention of Dr Singh that they were restored to the IAS and are today district magistrates.
The disabled have to come to the streets every time for justice, according to Abidi. Tuesday’s judgement will be a test of the political will of the governments at the Centre, the states and public sector organisations.
They will have to tell the Supreme Court how many jobs are available and what is the backlog. They will also have to start recruitment immediately as 18 years have already been lost.
Source : Deccan Chronicle , 10th October 2013
let seen judgement have our rights. pranamam to supreme court
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