The Odisha Government seems to have no concern towards betterment of around 13 lakh disabled people in the State as it is reportedly mulling to fill up the vacant post of the Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities (PWDs), which is lying vacant for around a week now, by rehabilitating a political person instead of an expert in the field.

Notably, Kastruri Mohapatra, who had held the post of PWDs Commissioner for three years, has vacated the post on March 26 after she was appointed as the State Commissioner for Protection of Child Rights. Sources said she even did not give charge to anybody to run the PWDs Commission technically.

As per the Person with Disabilities (PWDs) Act 1995, there shall be a Chief Commissioner in the Central and State Commission at the State level. For several years, the Odisha Government did not appoint any independent Commissioner for PWDs. After repeated agitations, it has appointed a non-disabled person as the commissioner in 2010.

Since then, only non-disabled persons have been appointed for the post in the form of political rehabilitation. Sources said the search-cum-selection committee for the PWDs Commissioner headed by Women and Child Development Minister Usha Devi has shortlisted three persons, including the wife of a former MLA who passed away recently and another person against whom charges of cheating disabled people have been levelled, to the Chief Minister to select any one of them.

Odisha Disabled Peoples’ Network coordinator Sanayas Behera said the Government was doing injustice to lakhs of disabled people by not consulting with them when appointing a Commissioner for them. Notably, on December 2014, a meeting was conducted under the chairmanship of Energy Minister Pranab Prakash Das, who is also a member of the search-cum-selection committee for PWDs Commissioner and it was decided to recommend a name of an efficient disabled person for the Commissioner post.

“There is a provision in the Person with Disabilities (PWDs) Act 1995 that the Government should consult with the disabled persons and other related stakeholders before taking any final decision like this. Unfortunately, the Government is taking decisions independently” rued Behera.

Source: http://www.dailypioneer.com/state-editions/bhubaneswar/time-to-end-political-rehabilitation-for-pwds-chief-post.html