Expanding Services for Deafblind People in India

State Andhra Pradesh Goa Gujarat Karnataka Kerala Madhya Pradesh Maharashtra Puducherry Tamil Nadu

The project will address fundamental causes of deafblind people’s exclusion by building the capacity of partners to respond to the needs of deafblind people, identify deafblind people and provide needs-based services in communication, education and rehabilitation; and initiate processes to promote the social inclusion of deafblind people. It will enable deafblind people and their families across the regions to move out of poverty. Services will be expanded for 10,000 deafblind people and 40,000 family members (direct and indirect) across 8 states of western and southern India. The real and practical impact of the project will be a) babies at risk of deafblindness will be screened in hospitals and remedial actions taken resulting in reduced infant mortality and improved health of children; b) deafblind children of 6-14 years will have access to education in schools or homes as appropriate, thereby reducing their social exclusion; c) teachers in the government education system (SSA) will be better equipped to support the inclusion of deafblind children in schools; d) deafblind young adults will have opportunities for livelihood through vocational skills, leading to poverty reduction; e) pressure groups in the form of networks of families, teachers and deafblind adults will be available to advocate for the rights of deafblind people alongside partner NGOs. Overall, the demonstrated impact of these interventions will provide models for wider adaptation beyond the project.

Promoting and protecting rights of deafblind people in India

State Andhra Pradesh Bihar Chhattisgarh Delhi Gujarat Haryana Himachal Pradesh Jharkhand Karnataka Kerala Madhya Pradesh Maharashtra Meghalaya Odisha Rajasthan Tamil Nadu Tripura Uttarakhand

The most significant impact will be on deafblind people’s lives. Deafblind people will have enhanced opportunities for education, health, livelihoods and inclusion within families and community. The advocacy efforts by SI (India) along with the CSOs and networks have had an impact on the government of India’s initiative to draft a new disability law, which for the first time will recognise deafblindness as separate category of disability. This will directly impact India’s estimated 500,000 deafblind population by way of government making budgetary provisions for ensuring the human rights of deafblind people are met. Currently, deafblindness is not recognised by the government and hence there is no government funding available for even the basic human rights to education, health, livelihoods and other fundamental needs. 100 CSOs will have improved technical skills and greater organisational capacity to act as advocates and mentors for other organisations and local networks of parents and deafblind adults. They will have greater information and knowledge of national and international legislations like UNCRPD. Greater CSO capacity will ultimately contribute to a stronger civil society. 1500 Government teachers will have improved capacity to facilitate inclusion of deafblind children into mainstream government schools and thus enabling deafblind children to access their right to education. There will be a cascading effect, with teachers trained, training other teachers. 1500 Parents/family members of deafblind people will have improved capacity and information about the rights of their deafblind children. They will have greater confidence in approaching government services (education, health, social security) and will be able to take informed decisions for their children. There will be a strong national and regional network of parents to give a collective voice to parents/families of deafblind people in the country. The networks will have adequate information on advocacy actions supported by the advocacy toolkit and trainings on national and international legislation like UNCRPD.

Developing deafblind infrastructure in North India

State Delhi

Through this project we will be able to reach-out to 2500 (500 directly and 2000 through training SSA/govt teachers) deafblind persons in the next three years. Through this project we plan to engage with the state governments (with special focus in SSA missions) to build the capacity of teachers and state education infrastructure to include deafblind children into mainstream schools. We will leverage on our national advocacy initiatives based on UNCRPD and RTE legislations. To support all these activities the Regional Learning Centre on deafblindness will be set up in Delhi/NCR in the first year of the project along with home/centre based services for deafblind children in five states of the region. SI(I)’s programme support unit will spearhead all the training, advocacy, capacity building and monitoring activities in close coordination with the RLC. The project design process primarily focuses on consultations with the organisation that will act as Regional Learning Centre. The four state partner NGOs, families of deafblind children, teachers and deafblind adults. The design builds on our 14 years of experience in developing deafblind services and building capacities of local partners NGOs across 20 states of India. It is important to emphasize the challenges in engaging deafblind people in the design process, given their communication needs. Our experience working with deafblind people has provided us with a good understanding of their priority needs. The analysis culminated in the option to provide a range of services to deafblind people, rather than focus on one aspect, given the multi-dimensional nature of poverty and various needs of deafblind people at different stages of their life from birth to adulthood. Some of the key strategies of the project include: 1. Setting up of the State Learning Centres on deafblindness and train partner staff 2. The development of appropriate health and educational services for the deafblind children identified 3. Build capacity of the partners and state governments (SSA) to work with deafblind people 4. Develop and promote networks of families, teachers and deafblind adults as support groups for advocacy A spectrum of approaches and activities (as stated below) is therefore required. These will build on the output to strengthen the capacity of the Regional Learning Centre (RLC) and establish 4 state programmes to deliver Early Intervention, Education and Vocational Training services for deafblind people.

Akhil Paul

Executive Director

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Telephone 91-79-26301282
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Shivkumar Sharma

Senior Manager - Digital Engagement

shiv@senseintindia.org

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Telephone 91-79-26301282
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