JKHA demands necessary changes in job reservation

Srinagar, Sept 28:  The Jammu and Kashmir Handicapped Association (JKHA) on Friday sought the Governor’s administration to make the necessary changes in the procedure for providing reservation to their members in the government jobs.

At present, the handicapped persons are being provided with threepercent reservation in the government jobs through vertical method.

“Vertical procedure is against our interests. By virtue of this method, department specific reservation is being provided to us. Many departments argue that amid   few posts they can’t provide reservation,” said president,JKHA Abdul Rashid.

Rashid said instead of following the vertical, the horizontal method will eradicate unemployment among handicaps to a larger extenttherefore,government should take note of the hardships being faced by them.

“As per official figures, there are 3.80 lakh handicaps, but as per our survey the figure is more than six lakh, as many have been rendered disable by pellets.Once horizontal method comes into force,we will get more share in the government jobs asvacancies of all the departments will be clubbed and reserved specifically for us,” Rashid said.

“At present, the departments give reservation only when jobs advertised are more than 33 in number,” Rashid added.

Asking for immediate implementation of disability act of 2016, he said that the act would ensure four percent reservation to them.

“In other states, the disable persons are enjoying equal rights and care from the government but here we are facing government’s apathy From last so many months,the act has not been implemented,”president JKHA said.

“We were assured that a census would be carried out to find out the number of educated disables.A process was to be initiated for enrolling persons with disabilities in order to allot unique identification disability cards, but till date nothing has happened in this regard either,”he said.

Seeking Governor Satya Pal Malik’s intervention, Rashid said that disables also have a right to live with honour and dignity.

“State trust is still a distant dream.The trust was supposed to bear the expenses of disables that they incurduring their medical treatments, implants and other related health issues,” he said.