MxMIndia

Tag: PwD

  • The scrapping of the entire Accessibility Experience Team could impact the PwD-friendly platform, writes Shruti Pushkarna

    Will the Twitter Takeover lead to Muzzling of the Disabled?

     

     

     

    By Shruti Pushkarna

     

    Shruti PushkarnaSince Elon Musk’s takeover on November 4, Twitter has been constantly in the news. For firing around 3700 people within the first week in the name of cost-cutting. For $8-a-month fee to get the verified blue tick status. For scammers that popped up soon after the announcement of the Blue subscription plan. It’s been chaotic, in short.

     

    Both the Indian and the foreign news media have been nosing around for the tiniest whiff of this musky saga. Chasing all angles of the unraveling stories, be it the woes of the Twitterati, their tweeps, the economics at play or the lives affected by the brutal layoffs.

     

    In the local context, we’ve seen moving accounts of Indians who stand to lose their H1B status after being fired. A tweet by the new CEO rationalising the nearly 50% reduction in staff to save the company $4 million a day, is hardly any consolation.

     

     

    There is another human angle to this disruptive development that has been missed by the Indian media. It’s how the new guard and the subsequent decisions impact persons with disabilities. However, there has been some coverage in the American media, of the disabled Twitter users’ fears of the changes being brought about on the social media platform. But unless you are a Disability Rights Advocate, or disabled yourself or related to someone who is, it’s not the most obvious issue that stands out in the flood of mainstream Twitter reportage.

     

    Let’s try and understand why it matters. And what has changed.

     

    Fifteen percent of the world’s population lives with some form of disability. Despite the huge numbers, the community has remained invisible for various reasons. Lack of access to opportunities, barriers in the physical and digital environment, stigma in the society towards disability and so on. The emergence of the internet, technology and finally social media, provided a possibility of engagement to these faceless people, giving them a chance to voice their ideas and opinions.

     

    Social media platforms level out the differences that may exist in the physical world, extending an equal chance to mingle with the mainstream. The vulnerabilities and the discrimination fade away to a great extent.

     

    Up until now, Twitter has made significant efforts to make the platform accessible for persons with disabilities. In 2016, it introduced ALT (alternative) text for images where you can add description for non-textual content, to help users with low vision, blindness or cognitive disabilities. In a statement released in September 2020, Twitter promised to enhance its efforts to make the platform more accessible, announcing new teams placed in-charge of focusing on user experience. A new handle, @TwitterA11y carried all updates on product/ service accessibility.

     

    If you are wondering what are these features and how do they make it possible for people with different types of disabilities to engage on the platform, here’s a list naming a few:

    1. Image Description

    2. Captions

    3. High Contrast Buttons

    4. Left-aligned text

    5. White background

    6. Accessible content labels

    7. Keyboard shortcuts

    8. Reduce Motion

    9. Auto-generated Captions

    10. Magic Tap action to compose tweets

     

    And there are several more, including different settings for Web, iOS and Android users. Earlier this year, the Twitter Accessibility Experience Team rolled out the ALT text badge and new Closed Captions (CC) button. The visible The ALT badge on images lets you know when someone has added a description to their image. The CC button appears in the top-right corner of a video that has captions available, giving you the option of turning captions on or off.

     

    Now here’s the big news.

     

    On November 4, 2022, Elon Musk scrapped the entire Accessibility Experience Team, along with other important ones like Human Rights, Communications, Public Policy et cetera.

     

     

    Rejected and dismissed by surrounding community, many disabled people found a new home on social media. A place that helps them discuss issues, find support and answers, pursue interests other than disability and make friends beyond physical boundaries. Not all platforms are mindfully geared towards accessibility needs of the PwD (persons with disabilities) groups. Twitter was leading by example. Many users looking for alternative platforms of interaction, have now been reporting barriers of access on platforms like Mastodon and so on.

     

    On one hand, Musk publicly vouches for making Twitter a space for citizens, and yet on the other, sidesteps the needs of more than 1 billion people. Would it be an exaggeration to call this another Nazi-like propaganda against the disabled?

     

    So why are we publishing this column on an A&M site? Well, we strongly feel that the media can help in dramatically transforming the world for persons with disabilities. And this series can help bring forth issues that the media must champion to create a truly inclusive and accessible India. To write this column, we invited Shruti Pushkarna, a former journalist who now works as Director, EnAble India where she heads North India operations as well as media and communications outreach. Shruti writes for MxMIndia every other Thursday. Her views here are personal. To access the archives of all her 60-plus columns, please visit: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/shruti-pushkarna/

     

     

  • It’s time for the media to go beyond inspiration porn and focus on consistent hard-hitting coverage of issues facing the disabled population, writes Shruti Pushkarna

    Shruti Pushkarna: Disability Inclusion: How far are we from a Sugamya and Saksham Bharat?

    Shruti PushkarnaBy Shruti Pushkarna

     

    In his first term, Prime Minister Narendra Modi was applauded for path-breaking campaigns like Swachh Bharat, Jan Dhan Yojana, Sugamya Bharat, Ujjwala Yojana and so on. The promise of ‘inclusion’ for larger sections of the Indian population gave the country hope for a better tomorrow, or ‘Acchhe Din’.

     

    Having been sidelined and neglected for decades, the disabled community felt vindicated with the announcement of the Accessible India movement in 2015. Finally, the lack of ‘access’ was acknowledged at a national level. In a move to dignify their existence, PM Modi also coined a new term, ‘divyangjan’ or divine being replacing the demeaning usage of ‘viklang’ or handicapped.

     

    Furthermore, the passage of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (RPWD) Act 2016 was celebrated as a landmark moment. Repealing the 1995 Act, the new legislation included 21 types of disabilities, with a view to empower and enable as opposed to a dependence on mere handouts.

     

    Often persons with disabilities face entry-level barriers in education and employment. The reasons could vary, discrimination, poor financial condition, ignorance or inaccessibility. And that adversely impacts their social and financial standing, mis-shaping the general societal perception.

     

    The RPWD Act 2016 introduced new sections, providing rights and entitlements to ensure barrier free access to the physical infrastructure as well as to information and communication technologies (ICT). Four per cent reservation in government jobs, equal opportunity policy for private establishments in addition to incentives for recruiting at least five per cent disabled employees, and extending the right to free education to every disabled child between the age group of 6 and 18 years, are some of the pertinent steps to level out the playing field.

     

    With all these initiatives and asseverations, one would assume all is hunky-dory. Except it’s not.

     

    The leadership seems to have mastered the art of utopian announcements. Spinning yarns ridden with lopsided statistics, they have created a false picture of progress to sway voters. The ground reality is not as idyllic as the written word. Red tapism, absence of coordination between departments and ministries as well as Central and State governments, creates roadblocks in implementation.

     

    Unique Disability ID (UDID) is a case in point. The UDID portal, swavlambancard.gov.in was launched in 2016 with the intent of creating a national database of persons with disabilities (PwDs) and also to ensure easy access to schemes and benefits. As opposed to a state issued Disability Certificate, UDID is valid pan-India, which enables PwDs to avail government provisions without producing multiple documents.

     

    But the rollout has been shoddy. As of March 2021, 54.84 lakh UDIDs have been issued against nearly 1.66 crore Disability Certificates. Across states, disabled folk face challenges in online application, medical verification from district hospitals, tracking the issuance status, editing wrongly registered details on printed IDs et cetera. Even after completing all the steps in registration, thousands of PwDs haven’t received their cards. See tweet below.

     

    1) Applied in 2016 till 2021 waiting (19150000016100029048)
    2) A Municipality/SUB DIVISION (HMC/SADAR )missing from WEB Page Application Form Howrah Dist ,WEST BENGAL #UDID@Drvirendrakum13@socialpwds @RamdasAthawale @kataria4ambala @MSJE_AIC@MSJEGOI#DigitalIindia pic.twitter.com/30w4lSbhFK

    — Mangal Hazra (@mangalhazra3) July 22, 2021

    A tweet stating UDID applied in 2016 has still not been received

     

    From June 1, 2021, the Centre notified for all disability certificates to be issued online. “The Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (DEPwD), Government of India has issued Gazette notification SO 1736(E) dated 05.05.2021 making it mandatory for all States/UTs to grant certificate of disability through online mode only using UDID portal w.e.f. 01.06.2021.”

     

    The notification conveniently puts the onus on the States and local hospitals at a time when they are preoccupied with administering vaccines and managing Covid-19. How does the Centre plan to achieve the desired digitisation when the online process so far has been moving slower than molasses?

     

    Just last week, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment issued a notification exempting all posts under the Indian Police Service and Indian Railway Protection Force from the provision of four per cent reserved quota for persons with benchmark disabilities. This goes against Section 34 of RPWD Act 2016 which states that “the appropriate Government, in consultation with the Chief Commissioner or the State Commissioner, as the case may be, may, having regard to the type of work carried out in any Government establishment, by notification and subject to such conditions, if any, as may be specified in such notifications exempt any Government establishment from the provisions of this section.”

     

    In this case, only the posts for combatant roles should be exempt from reservation. Interestingly, a separate notification issued on the same day by the Ministry distinguishes between combatant and non-combatant roles, exempting all combat posts in the Border Security Force, the Central Reserve Police Force, the Central Industrial Security Force, the Indo-Tibetan Border Police, the Sashastra Seema Bal and the Assam Rifles.

     

    It’s important to note that all reserved posts are based on the jobs identified for PwDs by a specially appointed committee. There are several skilled and unskilled roles under Group A, B, C and D categories, where disabled people can be hired as clerks, technical specialists, engineers, delivery assistants, cleaners, telephone operators, designers etc.

     

    On January 4, 2021 the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities notified 3566 posts in Central Government establishments as suitable for persons with benchmark disabilities, adding 593 new posts to the previous list issued in 2013. The latest detailed list can be seen here: http://disabilityaffairs.gov.in/content/upload/uploadfiles/files/224370.pdf

     

    There are many more examples that point to a lackadaisical approach of the government when it comes to integrating persons with disabilities into the mainstream. While progress has been made on several counts, we need stricter enforcement and execution of policies. Empty sloganeering won’t suffice.

     

    It’s also time for the media to go beyond inspiration porn and focus on consistent hard-hitting coverage of issues facing the disabled population.

     

     

    Shruti Pushkarna heads operations of the New Delhi-based Score Foundation where she works as Director-Programmes & Communications. She is a former journalist (part of the founding team of MxMIndia) who has moved full-time to the social sector. Shruti writes for MxMIndia every other Thursday. Her views here are personal. You can tweet your comments and suggestions to @shrutipushkarna