Recently during Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh’s maiden visit to Orissa, once again it was re-established that the most powerful word that drives the politicians and bureaucrats in contemporary Orissa is the infamous three-letter word KBK (Kalahandi–Bolangir–Koraput). It has been more than a decade that KBK area has been showered with specially designed programmes, grants, and so many high profile visits. Unfortunately, the benefits of all these assistances are yet to reach the people of the region.
‘Education for all’ still remains a distant dream, and for the disabled, it is even more remote in India. A recent survey of the National Center for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP), revealed that only 1.2 per cent of the disabled in India has had any form of education. In its effort to conduct an all-India school-level survey, NCPEDP found that out of the 89 schools, 34 did not have a single disabled student, and unfortunately, 18 of them had a policy against giving admission.