Tribune News Service

Amritsar, January 21

To enable people with disabilities (PWD) vote, the district administration has instructed its officials to offer assistance and required facilities to them on the election day. Addressing a meeting of electoral officers here on Thursday, ADC Sonali Giri said all polling booths would have wheel chairs and assistance for the PWD voters. She said volunteers from NGOs and NCC would also be deployed at several stations to help them cast vote.

The administration will also run vans to pick up physically challenged voters and drop them after they exercised their right. The arrangements have been made to ensure smooth and hassle free voting for PWD voters. According to official records, Amritsar has 4,680 PWD voters, out of the total registered electorate population of 17 lakh.

The small fraction of the PWD voters, although, remains a significant group as they raise the issue of general apathy, lack of infrastructural facilities and support from any political party, which comes to power.

“Until recently, when the Parliament passed amendments in the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Bill 2014, which gives us certain entitlements, not much thought has been given to address issues of the PWD. The SAD-BJP government has given 170 jobs to physically disabled, but general infrastructure support and lack of grant has forced the community to live in neglect,” says Dr Rajesh Sharma, lecturer, Music Department of GNDU, who is visually impaired. He says such disregard for PWD problems was inbred in the social fabric.

Airing similar views, Mandeep Singh Manu, an artist with physical disability, said, “The word disable itself seems to be missing from political/social dictionary. No party or candidate has managed to take up issues regarding PWD voters, despite the fact that we comprise a sizeable number of voting population. There are still some basic issues that need to be addressed like having separate accessible toilets for us or parking spaces. I guess since politics is all about vote bank, no party has listed our needs on its agenda.”
Source: http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/cities/amritsar/special-arrangements-for-people-with-disabilities/353613.html