The Noisy Silence of Deaf villagers of Dhadkai, Jammu, India: A Case Study
Authors: Kathuria Dr. Sunita Joshi , Sharma Saroj 
Published: November 2022

Carlos Wallace stated that:-

_‘Actions speak louder than words, silence speaks the loudest.'_

Some may believe the silence is empty and reflects a vacuum, as there are no words in it. But, sometimes this silence has a more meaningful message than the said one. It is more powerful, perceptive, and strong than a message communicated through speech. And when the silence is unheard for a longer time, it becomes noisy. It tells the story of pain, hopelessness, and hurting life experiences. A noise which communicates a lot of messages that need to be heard and acknowledged by society.

A similar kind of noisy silence can be observed in one of the villages of India named Dhadkai, which is also known as ‘The Silent Village of India’. Dhadkai lies in Doda district which is 260 Kms to the north of Jammu. In this village, there are around 105 families with speech and hearing impairment and also with other disabilities. The village is home to an endogamous group of roughly 4,500 Muslim Gujjar community, a scheduled tribe of J&K which is proposed to be identified and labelled as PVTG (Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group) of India.

The Indian National Education Policy, 2020 clearly stated that the disparity and gaps due to gender, culture, literacy, geographical area, and economic conditions need to be bridged up. And, for this Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Groups (SEDGs) must be identified and mainstreamed with the system. Not only this, but the policy is also in complete consonance with the Rights of Persons with Disability Act (RPwD), 2016 where inclusion and equal participation of people with disabilities is highlighted. Hence the researchers aimed to explore and study one of the disadvantaged groups, with a special reference to People with Disabilities. On exploring, the researchers found that there are 3 villages in India with a high prevalence of specific disability i.e. ‘deafness’ among the villagers. Hence, to study in detail, one of the villages was selected as a case study.

The objectives of this research were to study the current situation of Dhadkai village and explore the challenges of the deaf villagers with respect to their accessibility to education. The findings of the research revealed that with this hereditary concern, many families have been struggling hard to earn their daily living. In addition to poor economic conditions, the deaf population of this village had never been to any school in their life. Moreover, there had never been any provision of educational and vocational training for deaf individuals. With respect to their communication skills, the deaf people of Dhadkai use local sign language and have a very limited vocabulary. The positive aspects of the findings were that this village has a good number of children and youth with deafness who can be educated and trained in various vocations. Some of them have already started learning Indian Sign Language under the Indian Army Project. Through this paper, the authors submit their suggestions and present the scope of interventions which can be made independently and in collaboration with different ministries of the Indian government like the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Ministry of Education, and Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. The villagers have high expectations and hope from the Government of India and dream to observe development in the village for the benefit of the villagers, society, and nation.