A mocking comment by Prime Minister Narendra Modiregarding dyslexia has disability rights groups in India fuming.
The comment was made during a video conference interaction with students at the Smart India Hackathon 2019 organised by the India Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee. A BTech student from Uttarakhand was explaining to the PM that her project related to people with dyslexia and said, “I feel really blessed to get this opportunity to… express my words in front of you…. Basically, our idea is based on dyslexic people. Dyslexic children are those whose learning and writing pace is very slow. But their intelligence and creativity levels are quite high”. She then went on to cite the example of a character from the film Taare Zameen Par.
Video recordings of the event show that the PM interrupted her and said, “Could this idea help any 40 or 50-year-old child?” He them started laughing and many in the audience joined him. He went on to say, “Will this scheme work for 40-50 years old children” and continued to laugh.
The video soon went viral and many people, including disability rights groups, have interpreted the comments as a dig at and his mother Sonia Gandhi. There were comments on social media criticising PM Modi for taking pot shots at political rivals in such a manner.
Vinod Kapri said, “Can’t believe. PRIME MINISTER making fun of Dyslexia”, while Saurabh Pratap Singh tweeted, “I am dyslexic. I suffer from ADHD. This man, @narendramodi, is my PM. He clearly doesn’t know s*!t about it!!”. Roshan Rai added, “A Prime Minister mocking dyslexia is nothing short of insensitive and shameful. Nothing funny or 'savage' in it”.
There was also anger expressed over the laughter and claps by the students present. One tweet said, “The worst part is… educated youth clapping over his remarks”.
The PM's remark has been condemned in the strongest possible terms by national cross disability rights platform National Platform for the Rights of the Disabled (NPRD). By taking pot-shots at his political rivals instead of answering a student’s question, the Prime Minister’s behaviour was unpardonable, said the NPRD.
Facebook comments