People's Democracy
(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
No. 19
May 12, 2013
|
Vol. XXXVII
No. 19 May 12, 2013 |
REHABILITATION COUNCIL
Govt
Plays Dirty Game on Chief’s Post
THROUGH
a statement issued from
The
statement reminded that the RCI, a statutory body, was
established consequent
to the passage of the RCI Act in 1992, and is mandated to regulate the training policies and
programmes in the field
of rehabilitation of persons with disabilities; to bring
about standardisation
of training courses for professionals dealing with persons
with disabilities;
to prescribe minimum standards of education and training
of various categories
of professionals and personnel dealing with people with
disabilities etc.
It
is to be noted that the appointments committee of the
cabinet (ACC) had
constituted a selection committee for the post of chairman
of the RCI and a
recommendation was made in June 2012. As per the
recommendation of the committee,
Dr Sudesh Mukhopadhyay, Ajay Kumar Mittal and Dr Manoj Kumar
were ranked 1, 2 and
3 respectively. However, since Dr Sudesh Mukhopadhyay is not
eligible because
of her being overage, the person ranked number 2, Ajay Kumar
Mittal, who is a
blind person, should automatically have been considered for
the post.
As
the government was delaying the appointment, the National
Federation of the
Blind, through its general secretary and senior advocate, S
K Rungta, filed a
PIL in the Delhi High Court. Rungta contended that the
department was trying to
bypass the committee’s recommendation. He apprehended that
the person ranked number
3 might be appointed.
The
Delhi High Court bench headed by Chief Justice V K Jain, in
its order of April
3, 2013, directed the department of disability affairs to
forward the
recommendation of the select committee to the ACC within
three weeks and
observed that the “selection will be normally based on the
recommendation of
the selection committee.”
There
are genuine apprehensions that efforts are afoot to mislead
the ACC against the
selection of Ajay Kumar Mittal. Any attempt at doing so will
amount to denial
of Mittal’s rights, denial of equal opportunities for
persons with disabilities
and against established conventions. It will also be a
violation of the UN
Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the
Persons with
Disabilities Act 1995.
