From the States

ALIMCO in the North-East

Recently, with the active corporation of Dhaligaon Refinery Consummers’ Corporative Society Limited (RCCSL), the Artificial Limbs Manufacturing Corporation of India (ALIMCO) under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, distributed assistive devices like wheelchairs and tricycles to physically challenged persons at BRPL Employees’ union office premises at Dhaligaon under Chirang district. Similarly at Marwari Yuva Manch premises at Bongaigaon, a number of assistive devices were distributed. 

Explaining about ALIMCO, Marketing officer Sanjay Dwivedi said that the organization started work in NE region in the year of 2002. They have already set up their Regional Marketing Centre at Gauhati Medical College. ALIMCO’s work has been regulated from the head office at Kanpur (UP). Currently the organization is working in 24 foreign countries. The Assam government has already allotted 12 bighas of land to ALIMCO at Amingaon, Guwahati for setting up a regional marketing office.

On the other hand, prosthetist & orthotist Pankaj Kr Gangwar said that beside providing assistive devices to disabled persons, artificial limbs are also fitted on limbless adults and children of any age group. ALIMCO supplies such limbs that are solid and last up to 5/6 years.

Further, ALIMCO has already completed almost 350 camps in NE region with overwhelming feedback. According to Dwivedi and Gangwar the strategy followed is the camp approach with children between 6-14 years age group being provided with calipers, tricycles and wheelchairs. They said all these assistive devices are given fee of cost.

Source: Aids distributed among disabled. Assam Tribune, Daily, Guwahati, 8 March 2007.

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Wither justice?

Sambhaji Gaurav, 52, sat out side the court room even 45 minutes after the court passed an order asking him to deposit with the court 50 per cent of the arrears that he owes the Central Railway for running a telephone booth on its land. Sitting there, he was thinking of ways to raise Rs 2 lakh to open his sealed booth near Dadar Railway station.

Gaurav has born with 40% disability. He has no legs and no fingers on his deformed hands. He moved the High Court against the Divisional Railway Manager, Central Railway when a circular issued by the Railways in May 2002 notified cost of the land on which his booth stood. This was to increase by 10% annually and also 10% of the commission that he earned from MTNL, BSNL had to be paid to the railways.

In March, 2007 the counsel for the Central Railways made it clear that policies pertaining to telephone booths allotted to the physically-handicapped had been revised in March 2003, according to which owners of all such booths would have to pay the charges as levied by the Railways. 

Gaurav had based his petition in HC on the grounds that the Ministry of Railway of Railways issued a circular in 1990 that stated that facilities like electricity and space for installing telephone booths run by handicapped individuals at railways stations be provided free.

However, as pointed out by the Railways counsel, Gaurav had been a defaulter ever since the policy had been revised and owed about Rs 4 lakh to the Railways. Gaurav’s advocate Manjiri Parasnis told the court that the booth was the only source of income for Gaurav and it was beyond his financial capacity to clear his dues with the Railways.

However, observing that a number of such booths allotted to handicapped persons are misused, Justices JN Patel and SC Dharmadhukari held that Gaurav must deposit 50% of the amount before seeking interim relief to get his booth re-opened.

“I can get up to Rs 25,000 and taking from friends I can raise up to Rs 50,000 at the most”, Gurav said.

The case will now be heard on April 10.

Source: HC succour for disabled, but he just cannot cash it. DNA, Daily, Mumbai, 6 March 2007.

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Accessibility beyond ramps

In an effort to be more inclusive, Delhi University is setting up a specialiesd resource centre for differently-abled students. The University plans to restructure its Graphic Arts Centre in the North Campus into a resource centre for the disabled by 2008 according to the University Librarian Suprabhat Mazumdar. The North Campus of the university already has a Braille library, but the ambition of the academic committee of the varsity is to provide equal facilities and opportunities to all the students, Mazumdar said.

“The Braille library is a solution only for visually-impaired students, but our aim is to help students with other special needs as well. They must also have access to the world of information that is available beyond books. We want to help them explore opportunities through the internet,” he said. The University plans to buy special softwares and audio-visual aids, including specially-designed keyboards that will facilitate the use of computers by students with special abilities.

“We are hunting for professionals and technicians who can help design a resource place that will be friendly for people with any disability. One of the experts from the Blind Relief Association is assisting us in the project,” Mazumdar said. Incharge of the University’s Braille library Harish Kumar Goel agreed that a premier University must have a system accessible by all.

“At present about 200 visually-challenged can benefit from the Braille library. Once the resource centre becomes functional, more students will gain from this endeavour,” Goel said.

“Already, about nine lakh documents have been digitized which are available to all. The University has subscribed to several foreign journals and no disability should be a hindrance in accessing these documents,” Mazumdar said.

Source: DU to set up resource centre for disabled. Metro Now, New Delhi, 12 March 2007.

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