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[KATHMANDU, 2 December 2007] – Nepal will replace its current legislation for people with disabilities with a new rights-based set of standards, according to the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare (MoWCSW).
Abolition of the current act is necessary because it embodies a welfare approach, said Upendra Kumar Adhikari, Deputy Secretary of MoWCSW. Existing legislation includes the Protection and Welfare Act, 1982, and the Disabled Person Rules, 1994. The Act provides for training to people with disabilities and giving them an allowance, but none of these things have been implemented. “It is a shame that we do not have exact data on disabled people in the country,” said Adhikari. The government bases its estimate on the population census of 2001, which records the number of people with disabilities at 0.64 per cent of the total population. But according to World Health Organisation (WHO) records, a more accurate figure is 0.84 per cent, which means there are nearly 200,000 people with different types of disabilities. “None of the decisions that have been made in writing and agreed by the government in the Act have been fulfilled to date," said Ram Prasad Dhungana, General Secretary of the National Disabled Federation. “Simply observing national or international days for people with disabilities has no meaning as disabled people in Nepal are still deprived of exercising their rights,” said Dhungana. Dhungana said the government had even failed to give allowances of Rs. 1,000 to persons with severe disabilities as announced in the last year's budget. “The medical identity card for people with disabilities, which was introduced by the government several years ago, was also of limited use as the cards do not specify the degree of disability and the facilities they require,” he added. “Until the government ratifies the UN Convention on the Rights of the Disabled, disabled people in Nepal will remain deprived of exercising the rights in the true sense,” Dhungana said. “Disabled federations are demanding that new acts should be made on the basis of the UN Convention, said Adhikari. Out of 47,000 children with visual impairments who are of school-going age, 6,000 are still out of school, according to Nar Bahadur Limbu, President of Nepal Association of the Blind (NAB), said that of the. “The main challenges facing people with disabilities are barriers to education and employment," Limbu added.