It was mixed reaction from the differently-abled voters across the city about the arrangements made by the Election Commission to make polling centres more accessible to them.
While several of them claimed that the ramps, wheelchairs and training provided to the election officials helped them cast their vote without any hassle, others, especially at polling centres in the rural belt, were found struggling for want of support.
Nearly 700 wheelchairs were brought in to facilitate glitch-free voting. Disability rights activist Dr. Satendra Singh of University College of Medical Sciences, Delhi University, said: “Wheelchairs are provided for both the elderly and those with disabilities. We had provided a list of eleven polling booths to the Election Commission where special aid needed to be given. We are happy to note that a majority of voters with disabilities had no problem today.”
A research student at Jawaharlal Nehru University, Nripendra Pathak (with disability on the right hand and leg), said he had no problem casting his vote. “The polling booths were accessible. And even my friend who is wheelchair user was given prompt help.”
But facilities for the differently-abled and the elderly were not up to the mark in populous resettlement colonies and predominantly semi-urban localities.
For instance, there was just one wheelchair available at the SDMC Nigam Pratibha Co-Ed Primary School in Tilak Vihar. Here, 92-year-old Jodh Singh complained he had to wait for an hour and a half to exercise his franchise. “First I had to wait near the gate for the wheelchair to be free, then it took me half an hour to cast my vote and finally for the ride back to the gate,” he said.
Gurcharan Kaur, 62, a cancer patient who skipped her morning treatment to vote, was neither allowed to wear a breathing device nor given preference at the polling station.
Navneet Sethi, a wheelchair user, could not cast her vote as the polling booth in Greenfield School, Safdarjung Enclave, had five stairs. Her car was not even allowed to park close to the booth.
Meanwhile, Mohammad Islam and his friend Harkesh Yadav, both of whom are visually-challenged, hired a goods-carrying rickshaw to reach a polling booth in Gopalpur, Najafgarh. “Despite our physical condition, the police didn’t allow us to be dropped near the gate,” complained Islam. He added: “Because of the absence of a separate queue for people like us, we had to keep asking others for assistance to walk us to the polling booth and then back outside.”
