People of Value

Chennai

Mumbai

Six students: Determination is what leads them on

A twist of fate confined them to their wheelchairs, and the ignorance in society made certain that they would not be accepted into the mainstream without much haggling. But these children refused to be cowed down and paved their way through by hard work, coming from sheer motivation.

Six students, Bhavana, Rajagopal, Shiva, Gnanaprasanna, Pavitra and Harisangar wrote the SSLC Examination. To the surprise of many, may be not themselves, they passed - scoring marks over first class.

All of them, expect Shiva, are confined to their wheelchairs due to various conditions, from cerebral palsy to Nustagmus. Shiva is an autistic child, who is in fact underage - all of 13 years of age though the norm to appear for SSLC is 15 years.

Radha Basu, the teacher at Vidyasagar (formerly The Spastics Society of India), who pushed them forward to realize their potential and attain it said that these children are very self motivated. She has seen their interest over the years that she has spent with them.

All at the Vidyasagar refuse to call them ‘special’ children, the politically correct word for one with disabilities. They believe that these children are in fact just like any other normal kid in their abilities if one were to look at their potential rather than mere appearance.

Rajul Padmanabhan, director of Vidyasagar said that these are very ordinary children. They are pranksters and noisy just like anyone of their age. All they need is a little flexibility within the set parameters to lead a normal life.

While appearing for their exams, all six were allowed scribes and an hour extra to write their papers for which the parents and those at Vidyasagar are very grateful. For, these children have physical disabilities that need an extra effort to complete their tasks.

Bhavana has a condition called Nystagmus, because of which she can answer any question only through eye sight pointing communication. In this, each alphabet is displayed in different areas on a chart and the scribe also has to be trained to follow the movement of her eyes. She was the first one in India to write an exam by such a system.

She scored 71% marks, and wants to pursue Library Science after her Plus Two. An avid reader, her dream is to own a library.

Pavitra, who scored 86%, wants to be a writer. Shiva wants to do research. For Rajagopal, Ganaprasanna and Harisangar, further studies in computer is what they have decided.

The joy at Vidyasagar reached the pinnacle when Lady Andal’s School offered to take them in for Plus Two. When they walk in tomorrow to the school with their parents for the first day of class, it will be a special day for these ‘ordinary’ children.

Source: Hard work brings them sweet taste of success. Indian Express, Chennai, 7 June 2006.

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Priyesh Bheda: A long drawn out battle for justice

Priyesh Bheda is a patient man. Every time his court hearing comes up, the 35-year-old physically challenged civil servant takes leave from his training in Faridabad, endures an uncomfortable train journey and travels to Mumbai, suffering loss of pay and discomfort in the process. It has been four times in the last six months that the Bombay high court has handed him dates, the latest being in last week when his case was adjourned once more to September.

Bheda fights his own case. But unlike the government counsel, he is not given a mike to air his arguments, nor a table to keep his files. He stands in the witness box and tries to make himself heard above the din in the Bombay high court’s large halls amid hundreds of onlookers. But the man, who lost his right leg in a 1998 rail accident, remains stoic.

He says that lawyers cost a lot. Since his educational background is in public administration, he decided to fight on his own against the government, for allotting him the less prestigious Indian postal finance and accounts service (IPFAS) despite him being the topper among the four physically handicapped candidates selected and ranking 271 out of the 413 candidates in the UPSC exams.

His troubles began in 2004 when in a letter to the department of personal and training (DoPT), he requested the government to take cognizance of the statutory requirement of 3% reservation for the handicapped and allot him the more prestigious IAS as per his preference.

With no response forthcoming, he filed a petition with the central administrative tribunal’s Mumbai Bench in the same year. Though the bench said that the appointment was improper and directed re-allocation of Bheda to the Pondicherry civil service where there was one vacancy for a person with locomotor disability, it was not followed.

In the meantime, armed with the CAT order, Bheda resigned from his job with the Reserve bank of India to undertake training for the Pondicherry post. After six months of waiting for the DoPT to follow the CAT order, Bheda filed a fresh petition in the high court. He was left with no option but to join the training for IPFAS.

Unlike M Satish, a physically-disabled SC candidate, for whom Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh stepped in to approve his appointment in the Indian Revenue Service, Bheda is embroiled in a long drawn out court battle. He said that he wishes Satish’s case could be taken as a precedent so that a disabled person did not always have to fight against discrimination.

Originally a stockbroker from Sion, Mumbai he was forced to quit after his accident confined him indoors for a year. During that time he decided to realize his dream of appearing for the civil service exams. He was fitted with an artificial leg and he joined the Reserve Bank of India as a manager. He went on to appear for the civil service exams and qualified for it in 2003.

Though the UPSC relaxes the age limit for a candidate with disability, similar concessions are not made when it comes to recruitment. As per the National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People, a non-profit Voluntary organization, 21 services out of the 26 civil service are barred for orthopaedically impaired people, 23 barred for people with hearing impairment, while visually impaired people do not qualify for any of the services. This despite the fact that the civil service makes sure they have scribes and Braille exam papers.

But Bheda remains positive. He says that it was his dream to be in the IAS. He hopes his determination would help realize it.

Source: Disabled civil servant fights govt for IAS slot. The Times of India, Mumbai, 10

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