Smt. Sheela Ganesh & Dr. M. S. Benjamin
ABSTRACT
The laws in a democratic State are expected to consciously protect the interests of the least advantaged persons and safeguard their inherent and indispensable right to human dignity and socio-economic development enabling independent and decent standard of living. Differently-abled persons are entitled to human rights and fundamental freedoms as their fellow citizens to become self-reliant. The UN, its specialized agencies and other organs of the UN have done pioneering work in this area by adopting number of Conventions to protect the rights of PWD, with a holistic concern combining civil-political rights and socio-economic rights with the full spectrum rights focusing on standard of living including education and employment.
Disability anti-discriminatory law around the globe has various approaches and the differently-abled persons are either protected against discrimination in Constitutional, criminal, civil or social law. Majority of the civil rights legislations are based on a structural equality concept to guarantee true equal opportunity for persons with disabilities in matters of employment providing reasonable accommodation or reasonable adjustments, which have to be taken by the employer, service provider, government or any other entity under anti-discriminatory obligations. The ultimate goal of socio-economic justice is to protect ‘right to life’, which necessarily includes ensuring dignified life and adequate standard of living of individuals (including PWD) to empower, strengthen economic security and enrich the society at large. In addition, the advancement in medical science and technology, specialized educational centres, vocational training, policy programmes encouraging self-employment and reservations in public offices, corporate social responsibility activities, overwhelming involvement of NGOs, inspiring success stories of PWD, society’s inclusive outlook, digital India initiatives, revolution in artificial intelligence, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Vision 2030, opens an ocean of opportunities and brings hope in accelerating employability among PWD, ensuring decent work and self-reliance – the primary goal of socio-economic transformation.
Keywords: Right to work, Persons with Disability (PWD), Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
