NEW DELHI: 69% of youth with disabilities in India live in the villages. Lack of education translates to lack of jobs and poverty- poor people are more at risk of acquiring a disability because of lack of access to good nutrition, health care, sanitation, as well as safe living and working conditions. This vicious circle can only be broken by skill development and employment.
It is known that 80% of people with disabilities are mostly concentrated in under-developed and developing countries (global south) like India.
With a vision for skill development and employment among youth with disabilities, NCPEDP (National Centre for Promotion of Education for Disabled People) together with Skill Council for Persons with Disabilities and Youth4Jobs is organizing a “Skilling Youth with Disabilities” workshop on 11th Oct 2019 at Casurina Hall – The Indian Habitat Centre, New Delhi.
The half-day workshop is supported by Axis bank.
Key speakers at the function include Sitaram Yadav, Deputy Secretary, Skill Training, MSJE, Anup, CEO,Skill Council for Persons with Disability (SCPwD), Annavaram, Professor, Hyderabad University.
“The case studies of employment of persons with disabilities that we celebrate is largely an urban phenomena,” says Arman Ali, ED, NCPEDP. “For e.g.; the IT industry in cities like Mumbai, Bangalore and Delhi is involved in training and placing people with disabilities in jobs, but this is limited to only 30 people a year at best. However, 69% of youth with disabilities in India live in the villages. Most educational institutions in the country don’t have special educators; even mainstream skill training programmes have little or no participation of candidates with disabilities – given the inaccessibility of infrastructure and curriculum. Even the most determined youngsters get left behind.It is to discuss these issues, identify solutions, understand and adopt best practices from other players in the sector, that we are organising this conference.”
The Right of Persons with Disabilities Act (RPwD) enacted in 2016 mandates the Government to create schemes that will promote Skill Development of Persons with Disabilities in order to enhance their scope of employability.
This now encompasses the inclusion of persons with disabilities in all mainstream formal and non-formal vocational and skill training schemes and advertisement programmes. The conference is a move towards making this a reality.
