Geneva: Millions of disabled people in
India, drawn from the poorest sections of the society, receive only a pittance from the government`s social welfare budget- as compared to billions of rupees granted to cricket and the corporate sector through generous fiscal sops, a report says.
"In India, in 2005-2006, the spending on the welfare
of people with disabilities - which focused on support to
national disability institutions, non-government organisations
providing services and spending on assistive devices-
represented 0.05 per cent of Ministry of Social Justice and
Welfare allocations," says the new report jointly released
today by the World Health Organisation and the World Bank.
"The lack of effective financing for support- or its
distribution within a country- is a major obstacle to
sustainable services," says the report on `World Disability`.
It said that India, which grants billions of rupees to
cricket and the corporate sector through generous fiscal sops,
has a huge number of disabled people to invest sufficient
funding and expertise to unlock their vast potential.
"More than one billion people are estimated to live
with some form of disability," the report says, calling on
governments to scale up the assistance for the disabled people
so to provide access to mainstream services and unlock the
vast potential.
Disabled people encounter a range of barriers in their
daily lives such as inadequate policies and standards,
negative attitudes, lack of provision of services, problems
with service delivery, and inadequate funding.
PTI
