This blogpost is written by Shabina Bano, Research Office, Score Foundation. Please note that Eyeway's Blog entries reflect the opinions of the author and contributors, meant to encourage debate and discussion, and not Score Foundation's official policy position.
Persons with visual impairment have the right to participate in political activities like voting. inaccessible infrastructure is a major challenge and it not only restricts access to services such as education, it also restricts a person’s mobility and the right to exercise their franchise. Therefore, in 2004 the Supreme Court of India gave ordered the Election Commission to provide facilities to aid electors with disability to ensure their voting rights are protected and observed. The court mandated the following provisions:
- Facility of Ramp/wooden ramp at each polling booth
- Separate queue for persons with disabilities
- The numbers corresponding to candidate names on the electronic voting machine should be written in Braille to enable visually impaired voters to read the numbers and press the appropriate button to cast his/her vote
- Polling station personnel to be courteous and render necessary assistance to enable PwD to exercise their franchise with least inconvenience
- Publicity in media well in advance to make PwD aware of the facilities available before hand, thereby encouraging them to go and exercise their franchise
People with disability including visually impaired people actively participated in the general assembly election held in five states in 2013. Talking to a few visually impaired people residing in these five states is indicative of gaps in implementation of the provisions laid down by the Supreme Court of India. State election departments failed to adhere to the order.
A visually impaired person from Rajasthan stated that he cast his vote with ease. He was given all aforesaid provisions, whereas a blind lady from Rajasthan shared that she didn’t get any support at all. Officers were rude and insensitive. She did not even get Braille print.
Mastram, a visually impaired person felt dependent and helpless while casting his vote in the recent election in Madhya Pradesh. Even after extending a helping hand to the returning officer by converting the list of contesting candidates to Braille, so that it could be made available for visually impaired people casting their votes at the polling booth, he did not get the list of candidates in Braille on the day of voting. He was informed that the officer forgot to carry the paper which was to be pasted on the EVM machine. Which is indicative of negligence and ignorance on the part of the administrator.
The scenario wasn't all that different across other states where election occurred in 2013. No accessibility measures were followed, such as, no prior campaigning to inform about facilities for disabled, non availability of Braille print at most polling booth, ill informed administrators at polling booths. As a face saving measure disabled people were allowed to cast their vote with a companion.
All these experiences of electors with disability indicate that the election commission failed to implement the basic 4-5 provisions laid out by the Supreme Court across these states. Perhaps, this also shows that people with disability are not seen as a viable voter bank and therefore given less priority in the electoral system.
The needs of people with different disabilities are very diverse, therefore accessibility guidelines need to be broad base and should be universal in approach. We need to propagate that one size fits all is not the solution and we need to think innovatively so that we can move towards accessibility and inclusion in the true sense.
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