News

Volume 6 Issue 8 - October 01, 2009

Amendment or New Law? National Consultation to take the debate further

D.N.I.S. News Network, India: While the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment seems to be going ahead with the amendments to the Disability Act despite strong demands from the disability sector to look at the possibility of a new Act, National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (N.C.P.E.D.P) is organizing a National Consultation on October 29 in New Delhi to take this debate to a larger platform.

N.C.P.E.D.P. has also formed a national level Core Group to broadbase this discussion. Javed Abidi will be the Convenor of the group with Vandana Bedi, Consultant, Disability and Development as Joint Convenor. The National Consultation would be organised under the aegis of this Core Group.

It may be mentioned that a delegation of Disabled Rights Group (D.R.G.) met Mukul Wasnik, Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment on August 29 and submitted a detailed letter apprising the Minister about the lacunae in the proposed amendments and the need for a new law. Wasnik also conceded that there were indeed more than a hundred amendments and it was necessary to make a new law instead. However, in a clear deviation from his earlier stand, the Minister recently spoke only about amendments at a recent meet of State Welfare ministers.