The pan-India group of health professionals with disabilities are demanding the allegedly discriminatory clause be repealed.
The Indian Nursing Council (INC) recently notified that the five percent reservation for persons with disabilities (PwD) in BSc Nursing courses only to those with lower limb disability, that too for the 40-50 percent disabled. The pan-India group of health professionals with disabilities has highly criticized the clause and written to the Union Health Ministry and the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities demanding the repeal of the discriminatory clause.
Moreover, they are also demanding the involvement of disability rights activists and nurses with disabilities in preparing the new guidelines.
The group in its letter has said, "INC drafted the revised Nursing Curriculum in the year we commemorated the 200th anniversary of Florence Nightingale’s birth, and despite the passage of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act (RPDA) in 2016, has continued with the discriminatory, unfair, and unethical guidelines that prevent otherwise qualified applicants with disabilities from entering nursing”.
Nursing officer Monika Dhankar said to The Hindu that nurses with disabilities have a unique way of connecting with the patients due to their experience of being patients.
“Nursing as a profession embraces the need to avoid discrimination, yet disability as an equal opportunity issue is relatively neglected in nursing. Nursing has a moral, professional and, in some countries, a legal responsibility to promote disability equality in the provision of nursing services. Adoption of the social model of disability in nursing practice, education and research as a strategy to challenge discrimination should be seriously considered. The utility value of the social model of disability in strengthening the social advocacy role of nurses should be investigated,” she added.
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