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Pass HIV/AIDS bill in Winter session: NGOs to govt
Expressing disappointment over the `apathy` shown towards HIV-infected people, activists on Wednesday demanded the government pass the HIV/AIDS Bill.
New Delhi: Expressing disappointment over
the "apathy" shown towards HIV-infected people, activists
on Wednesday demanded the government pass the HIV/AIDS Bill in the
Winter Session of Parliament.
Activists from a group of NGOs and Lawyers` Collective, legal advocacy group that drafted the Bill, said the Bill is very important in the light of the large-scale discrimination faced by the HIV positive people in the country. "It`s unacceptable that the government has not brought the Bill to the parliament till now," Pradeep Dutta of the Nai Umang Network of Positive People said.
The Bill was finalised in July 2006 by Health Ministry and was sent to Law Ministry in August, 2007. It has been pending since March 2010, when the Law Ministry cleared it. "We met Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad yesterday and he said the Bill has been sent again to the Law ministry. We want to ask why such an important Bill, on whom so many lives depend, is being shuttled between the two Ministries." Dutta said.
Anand Grover of the Lawyers` Collective said, "the stakeholders were consulted throughout the drafting of the bill, but suddenly the health ministry is being discreet and confidential over the Bill.
"We urge the government to take the community back in confidence and pass the Bill in its original form without tinkering with its important clauses such as easier access to treatment," he said.
Grover claimed that the Ministry was not in favour of including the provision for free health treatment to HIV patients in the Bill. PTI
Activists from a group of NGOs and Lawyers` Collective, legal advocacy group that drafted the Bill, said the Bill is very important in the light of the large-scale discrimination faced by the HIV positive people in the country. "It`s unacceptable that the government has not brought the Bill to the parliament till now," Pradeep Dutta of the Nai Umang Network of Positive People said.
The Bill was finalised in July 2006 by Health Ministry and was sent to Law Ministry in August, 2007. It has been pending since March 2010, when the Law Ministry cleared it. "We met Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad yesterday and he said the Bill has been sent again to the Law ministry. We want to ask why such an important Bill, on whom so many lives depend, is being shuttled between the two Ministries." Dutta said.
Anand Grover of the Lawyers` Collective said, "the stakeholders were consulted throughout the drafting of the bill, but suddenly the health ministry is being discreet and confidential over the Bill.
"We urge the government to take the community back in confidence and pass the Bill in its original form without tinkering with its important clauses such as easier access to treatment," he said.
Grover claimed that the Ministry was not in favour of including the provision for free health treatment to HIV patients in the Bill. PTI