Chairman of the Congress’s Physically Challenged wing, Muttineni Veeraiah held a half-naked protest at the Women and Child Welfare Commissionerate protesting against the merger of Department of Physically Challenged Welfare department with the Women and Child Welfare Department.
Mr. Veeraiah said a separate department for the physically challenged people had existed since 1983 to take care of their interests and the TRS government had merged it with the Women welfare hitting the very existence of the physically challenged people.
Across the country separate departments were created for the physically challenged people based on an Physically Challenged Welfare Act in 1993. An independent department for the disabled was also stressed upon in the 2016 Disabled Rights Act.
ADVERTISEMENT
He said there was no reason for the merger now and instead of focussing on the disabled welfare the TRS government was trying to destroy their future. “Will it be possible to do justice to the already neglected disabled people if there is no independent department with officials exclusively working for their welfare,” he asked.
Mr. Veeraiah threatened to sit on a fast-unto-death on December 3 when the World Physically Disabled day is observed.