AHMEDABAD: Such was the apathy of the state government towards the visually impaired that, when the high court ruled in favour of 11 blind candidates, asking the education department to provide jobs to them in November 2012, in February 2013, the government brought out a notification restricting the appointment. The division bench of justice Jayant Patel and justice Z K Saiyed on June 12, 2013 had taken a serious note of this notification. 

The government notification signed by the principal secretary education Sangeeta Singh stated that "a person having low vision can be considered to the extent of 1.5% reservation, provided the vision is more than 40% but less than 75%. However, so far as 100% blindness is concerned, the eligibility is only as a music teacher and not for other posts." The petitioner, Kaushik Akbari says, "The fact was that the government deemed us blind teachers unfit for the post of language teacher and the post of Vidhya Sahayak. This was negated by the division bench." 



The division bench judges ruled, "It is hardly required to be stated that once the judgment is delivered by the learned Single Judge of this Court on November 1, 2012, a government notification dated February 12, 2013 cannot nullify the effect of the judgment. Therefore, such ground would not be available to the government for non-compliance of the order of the learned Single Judge." 



Ravi Segliya, another 100% blind petitioner in the case, says, "The government colleges allow blind candidates to do BEd, MEd in languages and subjects but show no commitment to employ them. This is denying an opportunity. Gujarat is the only state that does this." 



Arun Oza, senior lawyer, who is also representing a few of the blind candidates fighting against the 2013 government notification, says, "There are a number of high court decisions in the recent past, directing the government to ensure appointment of the blind candidates in the past few years. Rajesh Mulwani versus the state government is an apt example."

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Zero-sympathy-for-100-blind/articleshow/48062504.cms