There are over 1.27 lakh people with visual disability in Tamil Nadu. Many of them have acquired higher education but to no avail, as jobs have been far and fewer. This has forced scores of people with disabilities to do menial jobs. A thirteen-day protest earlier this year by the College Students and Graduates Association of the Blind (CSGAB) urged the Tamil Nadu government to fill up the vacancies reserved for visually challenged (VC) people in its educational sectors. A TCN Ground Report.
Shalini S, TwoCircles.net
Chennai: Dr Aranga Raja, President of College Students and Graduates Association of the Blind (CSGAB), a disability rights group, admonishes the visually challenged residents of Karunai (Mercy) Hostel in Choolaimedu, downtown Chennai in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, to get vaccinated against Covid-19 as I wait to interview him. His animated nature splashes colour to the dull-looking walls. The residents begin to disperse from the common room after receiving instructions.
The stench of discrimination his community face hovers in the thick muggy air as Dr Raja talks about the protest held by the CSGAB in February this year against Tamil Nadu (TN) government to fill up the vacancies reserved for visually challenged (VC) people in its educational sectors.
There are 1,27,405 people with visual disability in Tamil Nadu.
Established in 1980, CSGAB is one of the pioneer organizations in the Indian Disability movement. The organization’s primary role is to uplift the differently-abled people in leading a self-sufficient life. CSGAB has also highlighted the role of the state government in assisting them to enter the job market. The Human Development Unit of the South Asian Region’s report on People with disabilities in India: From Commitments to Outcomes also points out the dip in the employment rate of the Persons with Disabilities (PwDs) from 42.7% in 1991 to 37.6% in 2002, a period where the employment rate of the general population rose.
A history of protests
Dr Raja said that scuffles with the police, blocking roads, going on hunger strikes or occupying buildings to seek justice is not new to them.
He recalls the protest conducted by CSGAB in 2013 with similar demands, the then Chief Minister J. Jayalalitha assured of conducting a Special Teachers Eligibility Test (TET), qualifying test to teach till secondary level in government schools, exclusive for persons with disabilities (PwDs) and recruit candidates through backlog vacancies.
Dr Raja calls this an “act of tokenism” as the examination and recruitment process was conducted without transparency.
CSGAB protested again in 2015 and 2018 as they were still in a state of despair and unemployment.
The continuing state of unemployment and the impact of Covid-19 on the informal economy in which many visually challenged people were working, provoked the protesters to resurface again this February near Lady Willingdon College in Kamarajar Salai, near Marina beach in Chennai. The protest was held from February 17 to March 1, 2021.
Nearly 100 visually impaired graduates, out of which 40 were women, gathered from different districts of Tamil Nadu. The graduates have either qualified Teachers Eligibility Test (TET) to be eligible as teachers till secondary level in school education, or the National Eligibility Test (NET) or State Level Eligibility Test (SLET) to be eligible as Assistant Professor. The protesters are degree holders in the subjects of Tamil, English, History and Political Science.
Stressing on the stigmatization and exclusion they face in private sectors, the protesters urged the TN government to recruit all the VC candidates who cleared TET since 2013 and have undergone the certificate verification process as teachers in government schools. They also demanded, “to appoint at least 100 VC candidates who qualified NET/SLET as guest lecturers in the government and aided colleges, and state universities.”
Aravind, 31, a native of Trichy, Tamil Nadu, is totally blind and has qualified NET. He appeals for the government to mercy-kill him. “I have all the credentials to be a lecturer and a teacher, yet, I sell candies in train for one day’s meal. Did I get a degree to teach or rove from train to train?” Aravind told TwoCircles.net.
Aravind is currently pursuing M.Ed in correspondence from Chennai. He qualified NET in 2018. He has a B.Ed. and M.Phil. degrees and started selling candies in trains in 2013 after facing rejections in job interviews for teaching positions.
Exclusion and limited opportunities
Dr Raja pulls out his smartphone and taps on WhatsApp to show a bunch of advertisements posted by colleges in Tamil Nadu without mentioning the vacancies reserved for PwDs.
He quoted a recent incident, where the famous Ethiraj College for Women in Egmore, Chennai, advertised vacancy only for the “general” population and after a rebuttal notice from CSGAB, the college released a corrigendum inviting applications from PwDs.
“I was asked to be ushered out by a non-teaching staff even before I could give an interview in a well-reputed private university in Chennai when I was looking for jobs back then. We are tired of the government overlooking our demands as a scheme based and not rights-based,” he added.
Raghuraman (VC) coordinator of Karuna Vidyalaya, NGO for the career guidance of visually challenged graduates told TwoCircles.net that “job opportunities are inadvertently limited for the visually impaired students because most of them have to settle for humanities degree and vastly explore teaching jobs.”
“Because of the exclusion they face in private colleges, they either look for jobs in informal sectors or prepare for government exams,” he said.
“The colleges won’t give us a seat in social science or any other field that involves complex theories, numbers or diagrams because it needs sight to learn. I know a girl who does economics but she became adventitiously blind so I don’t think it counts,” a graduate who is currently preparing for TET told TwoCircles.net.
Fate of special recruitment drive?
Prof. Sivaraman (VC), Presidency College in Chennai while discussing the protest, pointed out the disconcerting nature of backlog vacancies in the Tamil Nadu Teachers Recruitment Board (TN TRB) notification for 2021.
The TRB notification shows 67% of backlog vacancies reserved for Persons with Disabilities out of which 31% are reserved for Persons with vision impairment. Among the reserved backlog vacancies for persons with vision impairment, 20% vacancies are from the subjects English, Tamil and History, and 80% vacancies are from Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics, Botany, Zoology, Physical Education, Commerce and Economics, subjects that are not accessible for the VC.
“There are many backlog vacancies in the subjects that aren’t accessible for the visually challenged to even graduate in the first place,” said Prof. Sivaraman. “There is a special recruitment drive in every state for filling up such backlog vacancies. If no one is appointed for a long time, isn’t it the job of the government to contemplate the illiteracy rate of the disabled people and their accessibility to all curriculums?” he adds.
A pending order for equity
Dr Raja says that the negotiation with Selvi Apoorva, IAS, Secretary to the Government, Higher Education Department was not promising.
“John Varghese, IAS, Director for the Welfare of the Differently Abled, was not available to talk even after much demand,” he said.
CSGAB suspended the protest as the state legislative assembly election was approaching and provided an ultimatum till July 2021, to the State Commissionerate for the Welfare of the Differently Abled to fulfil their demands.
Dr Thirumavalavan, Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha, had visited the protesters and expressed solidarity.
“TN government has no regard for its para-sports personalities too, many of whom are struggling for a livelihood without acknowledgement,” he said.
Vijayashanthi, Asiad and Commonwealth Judo champion, also participated in the protest voicing her concerns.
Vijayashanthi is one of the residents of Karunai Hostel. Showing her certificates, she said, “I almost went to burn them all but my mother stopped me.”
“There is no use of these (certificates),” she added.
The concerned officials were not available to comment upon the issue. The story will be updated as and when TwoCirlces.net gets a response.