FOR MYSTERIOUS REASONS neither the Central nor state governments have paid more than lip sympathy to myriad difficulties confronting the country’s estimated 33 million school-going children with physical and learning disabilities. In the Union budget 2015-16 presented to Parliament on February 28, the allocation of their parent Union ministry of women and child development was cut by Rs.8,206 crore (44 percent).
Consequently, there’s considerable satisfaction within the community of NGOs engaged with children with disabilities that the Bombay high court has come down heavily on the new BJP-led Maharashtra state government for denying students with learning disabilities (LD) adequate authorised diagnostic testing centres. Moreover, the court also slammed the Delhi-based National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) for refusing them amanuensis (writers) facilities during the recently held class X and XII board exams. In a letter dated March 25, U. Raja Reddy, NIOS’ Pune-based regional director, denied 400 students amanuensis questioning the credibility of learning disability certificates issued by diagnostic centres and/or hospitals. Following parent protests and a letter written to the high court by well-known city psychiatrists Dr. Harish Shetty and Dr. Sanghnaik Meshram, Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice Girish Kulkarni took suo motu cognisance of the issue and directed NIOS to sanction writers to students suffering from LD for the school-leaving board exams starting April 9.
“The high court order has saved the future of hundreds of students with learning disabilities who were left in the lurch by the NIOS director after he arbitrarily withdrew the facility of writers a few days before the class XII exams. These children were provided with writers in class X by the same board after being tested at authorised learning disability centres. NIOS has violated the Disability Act, 1995 and its own bye-law 12.2 which clearly states that in NIOS examinations, learners with disabilities will be provided the facility of amanuensis, technological devices, calculators etc, according to their disabilities,” says Dr. Shetty.
Raja Reddy’s abrupt refusal to allow writers for LD children ten days before the board exams were scheduled to begin countrywide took the LD activists’ community by surprise since NIOS was established in 1989 as an alternative to the mainstream CISCE, CBSE and state boards for “providing education to those who are unable to attend school for a variety of socio-economic reasons and meeting the educational needs of differently abled children for creating an inclusive education system”. The world’s largest open school board, NIOS offers secondary school and vocational education programmes through the flexible open distance learning mode to an estimated 2 million students countrywide, and has 4,201 K-12 schools across the country including 26 in UAE, Nepal, Kuwait, Qatar, Muscat and Bahrain affiliated with it. Currently, NIOS serves 10 million physically and mentally challenged children, of whom 80 percent suffer from LD.
While the intervention of the high court resolved the crisis and enabled 400 students to avail the service of writers during the recently concluded board exams, the larger issue of lack of adequate LD testing centres in the state remains unaddressed. Maharashtra (pop. 112 million) hosts a mere four authorised centres to certify children with learning disabilities, of which three — Nair Hospital, Tilak (Sion) Hospital and JJ Hospital — are in Mumbai and one — KEM Hospital — in Pune.
At a PIL (public interest litigation) hearing on May 8, the Bombay high court bench headed by JJ Mohit Shah and Girish Kulkarni directed the state government to “come up with a proposal” to establish a learning disability testing centre in each of the 26 districts statewide. Moreover, it directed the school education department to submit a report detailing the number of students in the 8-15 age group suffering from learning disabilities in Maharashtra by August 15.
“The problem is not just unavailability of LD testing centres; there is also a huge shortage of special educators and teachers trained in educating children with learning disabilities. The state government needs to address both the issues concurrently to help differently abled children realise their true potential,” says Dr. Zirak Marker, CEO of the NIOS-affiliated Aditya Birla Integrated School, Mumbai (see p. 42).
While presenting the Union Budget 2015-16 earlier this year, Union finance minister Arun Jaitley justified the Centre’s reduced outlay for education explaining that state governments whose share of Central government taxes has been increased from 32 percent to 40 percent, will increase their education spending. This is a good opportunity for the BJP-led government of Maharashtra to fulfil Jaitley’s hope.
Shweta Nair (Mumbai)