Sugamya Bharat
Getting around
the physical built-up environment is something most of which take for granted.
Stairs, sidewalk, gratings, obstructions, curves, narrow passages etc. are
barriers, we walk over, around, or through any routine course. But, for those
with disability, a curb or few stairs can be a big barrier. We seldom pay
attention to traffic signals, audio announcements, signs which give us
information or direction to use various facilities. Signs, no matter how well
placed and how much information rich are users for persons with visual
impairment or hearing impairment unless designed properly
We are all
physically disabled at some time in our lives. A person with a broken leg, a
child, a mother with a pram, an elderly gentleman etc. are all disabled in some
way or another. Thus, Needs of the disabled coincide with the needs of majority,
and all people are at ease with them. As such, designing the facilities for the
majority implies designing and planning for people with varying abilities and
disabilities.
An important aim
of the society is to integrate persons with disabilities in the society so that
they can actively participate in society and lead a normal life. Ideally, a
disabled person should be able to commute between home, work place and other
destinations with independence, convenience and safety. The more persons with
disabilities are able to access physical facilities, the more they will be part
of the social mainstream.
With firm
commitment of the government towards socio-economic transformation of the
persons with disabilities there is an urgent need to create mass awareness for
universal accessibility. India is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights
of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD). Article 9 of UNCRPD casts an obligation
on all the signatory governments to take appropriate measures to ensure to
persons with disabilities access, on an equal basis with others, to the physical
environment, to transportation, to information and communications, including
information and communications technologies and systems, and to other facilities
and services open or provided to the public, both in urban and in rural
areas.
Subsequently,
governments of ESCAP region gathered in Incheon, Republic of Korea from
29.10.2012 to 02.11.2012 and adopted the Incheon Strategy to “Make the Rights
Real” for persons with disabilities in Asia and the Pacific. The Incheon
Strategy builds on the UNCRPD and provides the first regionally agreed
disability inclusive “Development Goals”. Goal No. 3 of the Incheon Strategy
mentions that access to the physical environment, public transportation,
knowledge, information and communication is a pre-condition for persons with
disabilities to fulfill their rights in an inclusive society. The accessibility
of urban, rural and remote areas based on universal design increases safety and
ease of use not only for persons with disabilities, but also for all other
members of the society.
Persons with
Disabilities (Equal Opportunities. Protection of Rights and Full Participation)
Act 1995 under Section 44, 45 and 46 also categorically provides for
non-discrimination in participation, non-discrimination of the roads and built
up environment. As per Section 46 of the PwD Act, the States are required to
provide for :
i) Ramps in public
buildings
ii) Provision of
toilets for wheelchair users
iii) Braille symbols
and auditory signals in elevators or lifts
iv) Ramps in
hospitals, primary health centres and other rehabilitation centres.
Department of
Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (DEPwD), Ministry of Social Justice and
Empowerment, has formulated the Accessible India Campaign (Sugamya Bharat
Abhiyan), as a nation-wide campaign for achieving universal accessibility for
PwDs. The campaign targets three separate verticals for achieving universal
accessibility namely the built up environment, transportation eco-system and
information & communication eco-system. The campaign has ambitious targets
with defined timelines and will use IT and social media for spreading awareness
about the campaign and seeking commitment / engagement of various
stakeholders. The Department has asked various State Govts. to identify about
50 to 100 public buildings in big cities and also identify citizen centric
public websites, which if made fully accessible would have the highest impact
on the lives of PwDs. Once identified, “Access Audit” of these buildings and
websites will be conducted by professional agencies. As per the audit findings,
retrofitting and conversion of buildings, transport and websites would be
undertaken by various government departments. This will be supported by the
Scheme of Implementation of Persons with Disabilities Act (SIPDA), an umbrella
scheme run by the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (DEPwD)
for implementing various initiatives for social and economic empowerment of
PwDs.
Department of
Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities is collaborating with Ministry of Home,
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of Tourism for creating
‘Accessible police stations’, “Accessible hospitals’ and ‘Accessible tourism’
respectively across the country. The Department is also coordinating with the
Ministry of Information & Broadcasting for enhancing accessibility of
Television programmes by incorporating features like captioning, text to speech
and audio description.
DEPwD is also in
the process of creating a mobile app, along with a web portal for crowd sourcing
the requests regarding inaccessible places. With the app, downloaded on his/her
mobile phone, any person would be able to click a photograph or video of an
inaccessible public place (like a school, hospital, government office etc.) and
upload the same to the Accessible India portal. The portal will process the
request for access audit, financial sanction and final retrofitting of the
building to make it completely accessible. The mobile app and portal will also
seek engagement of big corporates and PSUs to partner in the campaign by
offering their help to conduct access audit and for accessibility- conversion of
the buildings/transport and websites.
As an offshoot
to the campaign, Department has also sought Expression of Interest from IT firms
to prepare a mobile app in all Indian languages to locate nearest accessible
places. With this mobile app, any disabled person would be able to locate an
accessible bank counter, restaurant, ATM or theatre (and similar facilities)
nearby. The mobile app will also have provision of evaluating / rating the
accessible place by the users.
DEPwD is
intensively engaging with public even before launching the campaign. For
example, the department sought inputs for the logo and tagline of the Accessible
India Campaign on MyGov platform and received more than 500 entries for each of
these
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