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SOCIAL WORK 

DISABILITY RIGHTS IN PAKISTAN

Submitted to: Ma’am Rizwana.Submitted by: Sidra Shahbaz.

Naila Rasheed.

Hamna Amin.

INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY ISLAMABAD

DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE.

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Contents:

• Introduction:

Definition.

Types.

Causes.

• Initiatives taken by the Government.

• What needs to be done?

• Role of Organizations.

• Khuddar Pakistan – An Initiative by Telenor for

Disabled.

• ICT for Disabled – The Pakistan prospective.

•

Conclusion.• Reference.

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DISABILITY RIGHTS

What is a Disability?

A disability is a condition or function judged to be significantly impaired relative to the usual

standard of an individual or group. The term is used to refer to individual functioning, including

physical impairment, sensory impairment, cognitive impairment, intellectual impairment mental

illness, and various types of chronic disease.

Disability is conceptualized as being a multidimensional experience for the person involved.

There may be effects on organs or body parts and there may be effects on a person's participation

in areas of life. Correspondingly, three dimensions of disability are recognized in ICF: body

structure and function (and impairment thereof), activity (and activity restrictions) and

participation (and participation restrictions). The classification also recognizes the role of 

physical and social environmental factors in affecting disability outcomes.

Types of Disabilities:

a) Mobility and Physical Impairments.

b) Spinal Cord Disability.

c) Vision Disability.

d) Hearing Disability.

e) Psychological Disorders.

Causes of Disability: There are many social, environmental and physical causes of developmental disabilities, although for some a definitive cause may never be determined.

Common factors causing developmental disabilities include:

• Brain injury or infection before, during or after birth.

• Growth or nutrition problems.

• Abnormalities of chromosomes and genes.

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• Birth long before the expected birth date - also called extreme prematurity.

• Poor diet and health care.

• Drug misuse during pregnancy, including alcohol intake and smoking.

Initiatives Taken by the Government:

• Forty-nine Special Education Centers have been established in the main cities.

• Establishment of National Institute of Special Education.

• Master's degree level classes in Special Education at various Universities.

• Establishment of National Institute for the handicapped.

• Initiation of National Mobility and Independence training Center.

• Establishment of National Talking Book Center.

• Establishment of National Braille Press.• Establishment of National Training Center for Disabled Persons.

• Introduction of Manpower Development on Speech Therapy Programme.

• National Council for the Rehabilitation of Disabled Persons.

•

Establishment of National Trust for the Disabled.

Role of Organizations:

Pakistan Foundation for Blind (PFFB): In Pakistan, when a person loses his sight, the attitude

of most people changes because they think we can neither get a job, nor earn. The situation is

worse in case of girls because it is thought they would never get married. The society refuses to

accept your disability. People at home start giving you, bad food and bad clothes. In addition, the

families of these persons are reluctant and in most cases they simply refuse to invest in their 

health and education. As a result, they are deprived of basic and advanced level educational

opportunities. Families tend to believe that a Visually Impaired person will now lead an

incomplete life in every sense of the world.

Aims and Objectives of PFFB:

The objects for which the Foundation is established are:

To find a cure for hereditary transmitted Retinal degenerative disease known as Retinitis

Pigmentosa (RP) and other Retinal Degenerative Diseases in collaboration with National and

International organizations and laboratories working within the framework of the “Retina

International” of which PFFB is a full member and to improve the quality of life of partially

sighted and blind persons in Pakistan through the provision of welfare services.

Training Programmes:

Daily living skills i.e. orientation and mobility, self grooming, identification of currency, textures

of materials, using the telephone and talking watches, signing, washing and ironing, cooking,

first aid and awareness of gender specific issues.Vocational training in income generating skills i.e. tailoring, knitting, textile designing,

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embroidery, crochette, leather work, glass painting, beautician courses, preparation of greeting

cards, candles, and decorative flowers.

Khuddar Pakistan – An Initiative by Telenor for Disabled:

Khuddar Pakistan is Telenor Pakistan’s flagship corporate responsibility initiative. With

Khuddar Pakistan, Telenor wants to make a difference in the lives of fellow persons with

disabilities by addressing the challenges they face.

Telenor wants to change the public mindset by creating awareness about their abilities. They

want to help develop technologies that will give disabled the opportunity to actively participate

in the society. They pledge to integrate persons with disability fully into our workforce.

Telenor sponsors assistive technology training labs for persons with disabilities at National

Institute of Special Education, National Training Center for Special Persons (NTCSP), and

Special Talent Exchange (STEP).Following is the print ad (taken from Daily Express) that

further explains the initiative.

ICT for Disabled – The Pakistan prospective:

The core of confrontation posed by the emerging Information Society is the theory of universal

service; and how the freedom of information and right to communicate would further evolve.

According to UN Charter 1947 Article 19 of ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948’;

which states that everyone has a right to, “hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive

and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers”.

The future of today’s information age largely depends on the liberty of opportunities inhabitants

have to access ICTs and their ability to employ them. Apart from its increasing importance inbringing the world close ICTs have cemented a new way for the challenged people—physically

or mentally—to enhance their life experiences.

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According to World Health Organization “An impairment is any loss or abnormality of 

psychological or anatomical structure or function; a disability is any restriction or lack (resulting

from an impairment) of ability to perform an activity in the manner or within the range

considered normal for a human being; a handicap is a disadvantage for a given individual,

resulting from an impairment or a disability, that prevents the fulfillment of a role that isconsidered normal (depending on age, sex and social and cultural factors) for that individual”.

According to global statistics presently around 10 per cent of the total world’s population, or 

roughly 650 million people, live with a disability.

The major issues confronted by disabled people with respect to ICTs are “accessibility” and“ease of use”. People with different disabilities may not be capable of accessing and utilizing

ICTs such as a blind person may not be able to use mobile phone with no text-to-speech

capability, a deaf person may not communicate with the emergency services requiring spoken

conversation, a physical disable person may not respond to a website using mouse-clicks, online

videos may not be usable by blind and deaf people and people with cognitive disabilities may not

view an different pages of a website properly.

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In order to facilitate ICTs accessibility to disabled people, various economies and International

institutes have introduced special e-accessibility projects along with special guidelines. United

States passed an exclusive ‘Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and its

Optional Protocol’ adopted on 13 December 2006 at the United Nations Headquarters in New

York signed by 82 signatories.

The USA has an extensive array of e-Accessibility related legislation and regulations, and is the

international forerunner in this regard. Notable aspects include the Americans with Disabilities

Act (e-Accessibility of various services), Section 255 of the Telecommunications Act

(accessibility of telecoms equipment and services), and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act

(accessibility in federal procurements of ICTs). A number of e-Accessibility measures inAustralia are underpinned by the Disability Discrimination Act which prohibits discrimination in

relation to employment, education and provision of both public and private services. This has led

to measures to improve website, telecommunications, broadcasting and financial services

accessibility. In Denmark, under the Universal Service Obligation (USO), special

telecommunications services must be made available to certain defined groups of disabled

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persons (Act on Competitive Conditions and Consumer Interests in the Telecommunications

Market – Consolidated Act No.780 of 28 June 2007).

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an International community that develops standardsto ensure the long-term growth of the Web. The W3C has initiated a special Web Accessibility

Initiative (WAI) that aims to bring together people from industry, disability organizations,

government, and research labs from around the world to develop guidelines and resources to help

make the Web accessible to people with disabilities including auditory, cognitive, neurological,

physical, speech, and visual disabilities.

Pakistan is a country of 169 million people having 2.49% as disabled population. The

distributions of different disabilities within the defined population of disabled persons are shown

in below figures.

Detail statistics of present accessibility status with and usage of various telecom services and

devices by the disabled persons has been analyzed and presented here.

With regards to mobile phone usage approximately 80% of the visually impaired people are able

to access only voice call facility of mobile phones, whereas, 10% of hearing impaired persons

are just able to use SMS service, One of the main reason of lower usage by the hearing impaired

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persons is unavailability of text relay service to facilitate text-to-speech and vice versa service.

30% of the physically handicapped people are not able to use mobile phone services primarily

due to devices design.

As observed from the environment around us, the advertisement and promotion brochure of 

telecom companies greatly impact the minds of people and compel them to use particular 

telecom service or package of a particular service provider. But so far these advertisementmaterials and other documents such as bills, registration forms and other packages information

brochures of telecom companies are not fully accessible to the disabled person especially to

visually impaired persons. Unavailability of Braille text in the document prevent visually

impaired person to read any printed promotional material or billing information for ICT services.

Similarly access to telephone directory being offered for searching particular contact

information.

Disabled persons again have not been properly facilitated by this service. The hard

form of phone directory is useless for a visually impaired person due to unavailability of Braille

text. 40% of the physically handicapped people are also not able to utilize telephone directory

services. These people could be facilitated to use directory services via electronic means.

Nowadays, Internet has becomes an essential part in performing day to day operations of telecommunication operators, websites have emerged as a convenient medium to disseminate

relevant information to consumers. However, the accessibility of websites for visually impaired

persons is quite low, only 3% of visually impaired persons are able to use websites of service

providers.

Absences of sign language are posing difficulties for physically handicapped people

towards accessing websites of market players. Generally, the present status of e-accessibility for 

special inhabitants comprising 2.5% of the total population is not very heartening. A number of 

steps are required to ensure availability of ICT services to “Persons with Disabilities”. There is a

need to make policies for equal accessibility rights for disabled persons, conduct awareness

campaigns on the subject involving challenged citizens and guarantee good accessibility

environment for person with disabilities.

Following set of suggestions are made to support and enhance ICTs for disabled persons in the

country.

• Texts relay service, capable of handling communication via mobile, fixed telephone, fax

and mail system.

• Video phone relay service may be provided after once the 3G licenses are issued. This

service will offer call handling between speech and sign language.

• Access to emergency services through telephones and mobile phones for disabled

persons.

• Deployments of public call phones and their KIOSK (specially installed for disabled

persons) around the country.• The telecommunication services provider may implement W3C web content standards

and guidelines for disable people. This would give confidence to disabled people to access

online resources of operators and their involvement over Internet.

What needs to be done?

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• There should be a survey for assessing the exact nature of needs and requirements of the

Special Children in Pakistan.

• There is a dire need for developing expertise of Special Education.

• Promotion of early detection of disability.

• Enhanced cooperation between the community, NGOs and the Government.

•

Separate legislation for education, vocational training and rehabilitation.• Accessible environment to facilitate the special children in their mobility is required.

• There is a dire need of rapid service delivery for special children.

• Mobile Rehabilitation Units at the doorsteps of the community are required.

• Mainstreaming of the disabled children in the education system.

• NGOs involvement in rehabilitation of disabled children.

Conclusions:

We concluded that majority of people are not satisfied with the steps taken by

government for the welfare of handicapped people as corruption is also prevailing in

those governmental organizations which are working for the welfare of the handicappedpeople and so also people are not fully satisfied by the work of NGO’s. Most of the

people say that people with disability should not be ignored but they should be treated

generously and should not make them feel that they are not the normal persons or there is

lack of something in them.

REFERENCES

1. http://www.disabled-world.com/disability/types/

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmental_disability

3. http://www.nccwd.gov.pk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=112 

4. http://www.pffb.org.pk/

5. http://propakistani.pk/2009/07/24/khuddar-pakistan-an-initiative-by-telenor-for-disabled/

6. http://www.family-networks.org/disability_rights.cfm 

7. http://www.pdf.org.pk/articles_pdf.htm

8.http://teletimesinternational.com/articles/2037/ict-for-disabled-%E2%80%93-the-pakistan-

prospective

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