From the States

Assisted decision making

There is a need to move away from “guardianship paradigm” while dealing with issues concerning mental disabilities, states Justice A.P. Shah, Chief Justice of the Madras High Court.

Addressing a workshop, ‘Legal Capacity and Guardianship,’ organised by the Tamil Nadu State Judicial Academy, Mr. Justice Shah said: “We need to sensitise parents about the process of self-determination and assisted decision-making. All laws and rules, though well intentioned, will be of no help unless parents believe their child can be a participant in making choices, and believe it strongly enough to follow it in their daily lives. Assisted decision-making is giving a person ownership in a decision he is not competent to make on his own.”

Said the Chief Justice: “If some persons have difficulty in expressing and communicating their wishes, the solution is not to employ a guardian, but to develop ways, which make it possible for this person to express and communicate what he wants. This is what supported decision-making is.”

He added, “Let us not forget that the main object is to enable persons with disabilities to live as independence as possible within our own communities.” He also pointed out that the Social Model of Disability works on the belief that the “problem is not within the individual, but society, which does not meet this person in such a way that he can function.”

Amita Danda , Professor of law, said a disabled adult should be considered as competent as a normal adult and the issue of Guardianship should be considered as the last resort and that the existing guardianship policies should be questioned in the light of the recent disability movement, she said.

Source: Shun guardianship paradigm while tackling mental disability issues. The Hindu, 1 July 2007.

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Ad on eye donation receives medal

A commercial made by Gajraj Rao and Subrat Ray of Code Red Films, along with the advertising duo Manish Bhatt and Raghu Bhatt, creative directors of Contract Advertising picked up a Bronze Lions at Cannes Advertising Festival. Earlier, the ad was honoured with a bronze metal in Asia Pacific Advertising Festival at Pattaya, Thailand.

The first time this pack of four men got together was in 2003 and made the ‘National Anthem’ commercial. But this new ad is not about any product or a flashy car and most importantly doesn’t promise to change the lives of consumers in a flash. Rather the ad talks about a bunch of visually impaired kids and hopes that one day everyone will see this commercial.

Now, why on early should people waste three minutes watch a bunch of visually impaired kids-especially when time is money? Simply because the ad enthuses people to come forward and pledge their eyes. Especially when of the 9.5 million people who die in India every year, only 20,000 pledge their eyes. 

The film revolves around a day in a low profile “chawl” type hostel where all the inmates, including a bunch of young boys and the warden, are celebrating ‘Holi’.

The film captures the Holi revelers in action. Soon, objects like walking sticks used by blinds, a brail book, etc, are shown prominently in the film, before eventually establishing the fact that all the boys shown are visually challenged.

The last part of the film shows an elderly warden in conversation with one of the inmates. the former tells the boy about the colours on his smeared on face.

The boy then asks: “Warden kaka rang kinte rang ke hote hain? (how many types of colours are there?)”.
The warden replies, “Lal, neela, peela, hara (red, blue, yellow, green).”
The boy asks him again: “Yeh hara rang kaisa hota hai? (How does the green colour look?”)
And finally, the warden gives into this inquisitive child and says,” Ab yeh mein tujhe kaise samjhayu (Now how do I explain this to you?”).

The film ends with the voiceover of legendary actor Amitabh Bachchan requesting people to pledge their eyes.

Reactions: The film was uploaded on user-generated content website YouTube.com, where it crossed more than a lakh hits in three to four weeks. The film has also been supported by the Eye Bank Association of India, WHO is expected to send a proposal to promote this project globally. Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, Canada, has found this project thought-provoking and has forwarded the project of review by its members. European Eye Bank Association is considering supporting this project across Europe.

It all started with Manish Bhatt coming across visually challenged Holi revelers in 2005 in Nagpur. “After the national anthem commercial, we were looking for a theme which was equally big,” Bhatt said. The film was made and released during the pre-Holi time and some of the popular channels picked it up.

Gajraj Rao, director, Code Red, says, “When we made this film we were deliberately trying not to make it preachy or something that would generate sympathy. Because most of the public service campaigns try and do that.”

Source: Will the visually challenged ever see the colours?, DNA, Daily Mumbai, 30-Jun-2007.

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NDMC’s special gym!

There is good news for all those physically challenged persons who wanted to keep in shape by doing some exercise. New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) is constructing a unique gymnasium at Kaka Nagar in Central Delhi.

This first of its kind gymnasium will have specially designed equipment that will be extremely user-friendly for the physically challenged.

“As part of the welfare plans, we have initiated efforts to construct this unique gymnasium. Apart from being accessed by normal people, physically challenged persons would also be abled to take advantage of the uniquely designed gym,” said a senior NDMC official.

“The building, where the gymnasium is being constructed, will be constructed keeping the physically challenged in mind and will be made user-friendly for them. It will also house equipment specially designed for physically challenged persons,” he added. 

“We have already started the construction and it is scheduled to be completed in the next six months. The civic body has granted a budget of Rs 1.25 crore for the project,” the official further said.

The civic body, after talking the advice of the experts, would install the specially designed equipment that could be used by the normal as well as the physically challenged people.

“We are consulting experts who would be able to guide us to make the gym user-friendly for the physically handicapped,” the officials added.

Apart from providing the gymnasium for the physically handicapped, the building would also have a library, computer centre and a reading room for them.

The physically challenged would have access to these too as efforts would be made to make them accessible for them. Despite being a two-storied building, lifts would be installed for the convenience of these people.

Source: NDMC to construct gym for physically challenged. The Pioneer, Daily, New Delhi, 28 June 2007.

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DDA organizes awareness conference for its employees

More than two-and-a-half decades ago, when 55-year-old, visually challenged AK Dixit joined the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) as a clerk, he realized that reservation for physically challenged meant a job but not exactly productive employment.

Dixitji, as he is now known in the DDA, went straight to his bosses and said he wanted to resign. The reason: he was hardly given any work.

His point was registered and Dixit was taken on a tour of the office building and told about the functioning of the organization. Today, Dixit is not only indispensable at the Block D reception of the DDA’s headquarters at Vikas Sadan, but also the brain behind a unique conference that the DDA organized for its ‘special’ employees today. Dixit persuaded the DDA top brass to organize a half-day conference on “Enhancing Employability of Visually Impaired Employees using Assistive Technology,” to mark the 127th birth anniversary of Dr Helen Keller.

“There are several jobs where a visually challenged person can be as productive as any other man. I have adjusted so well that my colleagues do not even acknowledge that I am different. A lot depends on our behaviour, but sensitisation is very important and that is why we are taking this initiative,” says Dixit.

Helping him were 50-year-old, visually challenged Sonwa Sahoo and a 1971 war veteran Kalyan Sharma, who lost his vision after being hit a bullet.

“Since we perform this tough task throughout our lives we certainly are men of ability. All we need is opportunity,” said Sahoo, who works at DDA’s Sheikh Sarai office.

The DDA employs 16 visually impaired officials. Three per cent jobs at DDA are reserved for physically challenged. “This conference is a first of its kind and we hope that the suggestions made here would help us frame better policies for the physically challenged,” said Dinesh Rai, Vice-Chairman, DDA. M Ramachandran, Secretary (Urban Development), too, stresses that a city like Delhi with its irregular footpaths and protruding manholes, has to become friendly for the physically challenged.

Dixit has further plans of generating awareness, “It’s not that people don’t understand but sometimes the set up doesn’t support. A year ago, a visually impaired employee Chandrakant expired but his widow, who too was visually impaired could not get his job as the rules did not allow that. However, we have made a beginning and hope the awareness spreads from here to everywhere.”

Source: DDA organises meet to enhance skills of differently abled staff. Indian Express, Daily, New Delhi 30 June 2007.

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Disability pension rules

Our armed forces personnel have made seminal contribution to the cause of security, stability and integrity of the country. They come out in flying colours wherever they go - in the counter-insurgency operations, helping civil authorities during emergences like earthquakes or floods.

Owing to different climatic conditions, many personnel become disabled. The authorities, however, turn a Nelson’s eye towards low medical category personnel because all servicemen should be physical fit and mentally alert, according to rules.

It is the duty of the nation to look after these personnel and give them a handsome pension so that their kith and kin don’t consider them a burden on them. The disability pension scheme has lot of anomalies which should be rectified.

There is a need to simplify the grant of disability pension. The Sixth Pay Commission should provide a better package to the low medical category personnel.

Source: Simplify disability pension rules, The tribune, Daily New Delhi 30 June 2007.

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