Lok Sabha Question No. 266 (STARRED), answered on 2023-03-20
Subject: Lack of Educational Institutes for Disabled
Ministry: Education
Asked by: Kumbakudi Sudhakaran, Amar Singh

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL EDUCATION & LITERACY

## LOK SABHA STARRED QUESTION NO.266 ANSWERED ON 20.03.2023

## Lack of Educational Institutes for Disabled

## *266. SHRI KUMBAKUDI SUDHAKARAN: DR. AMAR SINGH:

Will the Minister of EDUCATION be pleased to state:

- (a) whether the Government is aware that very few educational institutions are disabled-friendly even after the 'Accessible India Campaign' launched by the Government;
- (b) if so, the tangible steps taken by the Government in this regard; and
- (c) the steps taken/being taken by the Government to reduce the dropout rate among the disabled, as the Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE) report indicates only nine per cent of children with disabilities complete secondary education?

## ANSWER

THE MINISTER OF EDUCATION (SHRI DHARMENDRA PRADHAN)

- (a) to (c): A statement is laid on the Table of the House.

STATEMENT  REFERRED  TO  IN  REPLY  TO  PARTS  (A)  TO  (C)  OF  THE  LOK SABHA STARRED QUESTION NO. 266 FOR REPLY ON 20.03.2023 ASKED BY SHRI KUMBAKUDI  SUDHAKARAN,  HON'BLE  MEMBER  OF  PARLIAMENT  AND  DR. AMAR  SINGH,  HON'BLE  MEMBER  OF  PARLIAMENT  REGARDING  'LACK  OF EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTES FOR DISABLED'.

- (a) to (b) Education is in the concurrent list of the Constitution and majority of the schools are under the domain of respective State and UT Government. State and UT Governments are the appropriate Governments under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act,  2009,  and  have  the  responsibility  and  mandate  to  provide  school  infrastructure  including drinking  water  and  toilet  facilities  in  schools  in  accordance  with  the  norms  laid  down  in  the Schedule  to  the  RTE  Act,  2009  and  as  per  respective  State  RTE  Rules.  After  the  launch  of 'Accessible India Campaign' (AIC), States and UTs have been repeatedly advised to ensure that all the schools in their jurisdiction have provision for accessibility through ramps with handrails and disabled friendly toilets.

The  Centrally  Sponsored  Scheme  of  Samagra  Shiksha  launched  in  2018-19,  has  a dedicated  Inclusive  Education  component  for  the  education  of  Children  with  Special  Needs (CwSN)  covering  all  CwSN  with  one  or  more  disabilities  as  mentioned  in  the  schedule  of disabilities of the Rights of the Persons with Disabilities (RPwD) Act, 2016. It aims to look at education  of  CwSN  in  a  continuum  from  Pre-Nursery  to  Class  XII  studying  in  Government, Government-aided and local  body  schools.  Samagra  Shiksha  also  has  provisions  for  Disabled friendly  Toilets,  Ramps  and  Ramps  with  Handrails  for  barrier  free  access  to  schools  for  all children.

The comparative details of number of all management schools having Disabled friendly Toilets,  Ramps  and  Ramps  with  Handrails  for  CWSN  as  per  UDISE+  data  for  the  years 2018-19 to 2021-22 as given below clearly indicate that the infrastructure facilities for CWSN have improved over the years:

|                          | Number of schools   | Number of schools   | Number of schools   | Number of schools   |
|--------------------------|---------------------|---------------------|---------------------|---------------------|
| Management               | 2018-19             | 2019-20             | 2020-21             | 2021-22             |
| CWSN friendly toilets    | 2,72,043            | 3,26,435            | 3,80,987            | 4,01,487            |
| CWSN ramps               | 9,88,097            | 10,19,964           | 10,67,752           | 10,69,795           |
| CWSN ramp with handrails | 6,40,944            | 6,59,264            | 7,29,114            | 7,40,395            |

- (c)        Under the Samagra Shiksha scheme, financial assistance is provided to States and UTs for undertaking various activities to reduce number of Out of School Children (OoSC) including opening/strengthening  of  new  schools  upto  senior  secondary  level,  construction  of  school buildings  &  additional  classrooms,  setting  up,  up-gradation  and  running  of  Kasturba  Gandhi Balika  Vidyalayas,  setting  up  of  Netaji  Subhash  Chandra  Bose  Avasiya  Vidyalayas,  free uniforms,  free  text  books,  transport  allowance  and  undertaking  enrolment  &  retention  drives. Further, special training for age appropriate admission of out of school children and residential as well as non-residential training for older children, seasonal hostels / residential camps, special training centres at worksites, transport/ escort facility are also supported to bring out of school children to the formal schooling system. In addition, under the student oriented component for the children with special needs, financial assistance is provided for identification and assessment of children with special needs, aids and appliances, braille kits and books, appropriate teaching learning material and stipend to girl students with disability etc.

Furthermore, NCERT has been creating curriculum based e-contents and transmitting these contents through 12 PM eVIDYA DTH TV channels (Classes:- 1 to 12) and 400 radio stations [11 Gyan Vani Radio Stations, 257 Community Radio Stations (CRS) and 132 All India Radio (AIR) stations across the county.  The details of the e-content developed and disseminated are given below-

- i. Talking Books: In all 377 NCERT textbooks from classes I to XII have been digitized in e-pub format and provided on e-Pathshala Mobile app which can be accessed by visually challenged  person  through  a  third  party  Text  to  Speech  App  which  provides  output  in audio format.
- ii. Audio  Books:  About  3474  plus  chapters  of  NCERT  textbooks  have  been  recorded  in audio format and uploaded on DIKSHA for learners including visually challenged.
- iii. NCERT textbooks have been converted into Indian Sign Language (ISL): Till date 4250 plus  ISL  videos  related  to  curricular  content  for  classes  I  to  VII,  glossary  words  in psychology,  history,  geography,  urdu,  economics have  been  produced  and  are  being continually  disseminated  through  DIKSHA  portal  and PM  eVidya  DTH  TV  Channels (One Class, One Channel), on regular basis to ensure coherent access of these eContents.
- iv. Guidelines  for  development  of  e-content  for  children  with  special  needs:  This  can  be accessed from https://ncert.nic.in/pdf/CWSN\_E-Content\_guidelines\_2021\_new.pdf.
- v. An interactive comic book 'Priya- The Accessibility Warrior' brings the message of need of accessibility and helps guiding the students in the right path and flourish the ideologies of being kind, helpful and solicitous towards everyone. The comic book is available on DIKSHA  Portal,  E-Pathshala,  and  NCERT  website  (https://ncert.nic.in/ptaw.php)  for everyone to access and read the comic book.
- vi. Live interaction series titled 'Teaching Learning Interventions for Inclusive Classrooms' is  being  telecast  on  PM  eVIDYA  DTH  channels, 5  days  in  a  week.  Till  date  501  live sessions (30 minutes each) conducted with mandatory ISL interpreter in each session.
- vii. Teacher training module for NISHTHA Elementary, NISHTHA Secondary, NISHTHA Foundational Literacy  and  Numeracy  (FLN)  and  NISHTHA  -  ECCE  for  online  mode covers the concerns related to inclusive education and nearly 60 lakh teachers have been trained.
- viii. Online Training on Accessible Digital Resources and Assistive Technologies conducted covering 15,964 teachers.
- ix. An 11,000 words ISL dictionary uploaded on DIKSHA.
- x. PRASHAST mobile app for screening of disability  at  school  level  was  launched  on  6 September 2022, during Shikshak Parv. Till date there are 40,515 registered users.

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