In this case, the Supreme Court had to address the validity of rules and orders that limited appointment of civil judges and district judges to persons with partial blindness (between 40-50 percent of blindness). In the case, a person with seventy (70) percent blindness was denied appointment as a judge because he was more than fifty (50) percent blind, the specified outer limit. Surprisingly, the Supreme Court came to the conclusion in the case that…
Category: Case Review
Discriminatory Law relating to persons with Leprosy struck down
Posted in Case Review, Disability Support, and Employement
Case Title: Pankaj Sinha Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors., MANU/SC/0986/2018 The Supreme Court in this recent judgment, issued directions to the Centre and State governments towards rights of people with Leprosy, including the repeal of archaic and discriminatory laws that categorise leprosy as non-curable and contagious, and the framing of rules for evaluation of disabilities by leprosy affected persons, awareness campaigns for general public, free of cost and in stock medicines in PHC’s…
Case Title: Jeeja Ghosh and Ors. Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors., MANU/SC/0574/2016 In this 2016 case, petitioner activist Jeeja Ghosh was forced to deboard a Spicejet flight due to her cerebral palsy, when she was on her way to attend a disability rights conference. The Supreme Court ruled in her favour as the conduct of the airlines was against basic rights of human dignity enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution, contrary to…
Physical Disability Category is a Reservation Category in itself
Posted in Case Review, Disability Support, and Employement
Case Title: M Selvakumar Vs. Union of India, MANU/SC/0075/2017 In this 2017 case, a physically handicapped person who had appeared for the Civil Services Examination 7 times asked for a 3-year extension in lieu of him also falling under the reserved OBC category. The Supreme Court Bench comprising of Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justice Ashok Bhushan held that that physically disabled category is a category in itself and cannot avail further reservations. The horizontal reservation…
Equal Travel Allowance for Deaf And Dumb Employees
Posted in Case Review, Disability Support, and Employement
Case title: Deaf Employees Welfare Associations and Ors. Vs. Union of India (UOI) and Ors. The Supreme Court in this 2013 decision, heard the petitioners/government employees who sought travel allowance equal to that given to visual and orthopedically handicapped employees and said that Human dignity of deaf and dumb persons is harmed when they are being marginalized, ignored or devalued on ground that disability that they suffer is less than visually impaired person which clearly…