Introduction

Civil 20 (C20)

Civil 20 (C20)

Civil20 is one of the official engagement groups of G20 that provides a platform for Civil Society Organisations (CSO) around the world to voice people’s aspirations to the world leaders of G20 countries.

Under C20 India – December 2022 to November 2023 – our Founder and Executive Director has been appointed on the Steering Committee of 5 individuals from across the country along with the Sherpa, Sous Sherpa of C20 and the Troika. This committee is the executive body of the C20 responsible for ensuring that the C20 is an open and diverse space that facilitates the transmission of a broad range of civil society views to the G20 India.

C20 India has 15 working groups with the most recent historic addition of a stand alone Working Group on Disability, Equity, Justice. Never before in C20 has disability found exclusive space.

Creation of this Disability, Equity, Justice Working Group is a historical step for the disability community within G20 processes, giving us the necessary space and focus to sustain the efforts to leave no one behind!

Disability, Equity, Justice (DEJ) Working Group

DEJ Working Group will bring together experiences and expertise of disabled and non-disabled civil society to advance a practical vision of economic development that is accessible, just, sustainable, and inclusive.

This working group will develop recommendations with relevance across disabilities to advance disability equity and inclusion through inclusive and accessible planning, implementation, and systems change.

More details available in the link.

C20 Inception

The C20 inception meeting took place in Nagpur on March 20 and 21 seeing delegates from more than 50 countries participate at the event. Rising Flame participated at the inception meeting. The inception meeting saw plenaries from all the working groups formed under C20 setting the stage and our collective agenda for the road ahead. Nidhi Goyal, Founder and Executive Director of Rising Flame was part of the Third Plenary Session on day 2 of the CIVIL20 India 2023 at Nagpur. The panel was on the theme ‘Role of Civil Society in Promoting Human Development’. The session covered the following Working Groups of Civil20 India 2023: Gender Equality and Disability (GED); SDG 16+ and Promoting Civic Space, and Delivering Democracy – Retrospect and Prospect. The session was chaired by Nivedita Bhide, All-India Vice President of Vivekananda Kendra, Kanyakumari. Speakers in the session included Gabriella Wright, co-founder, Never Alone, Dr  R. Balasubramaniam. Founder and Chairman of Grassroots Research and Advocacy Movement (GRAAM), Meg Jones, Chief, Economic Empowerment at UN Women and Pedro Bocca, International Advisory Member of CIVIL20 India 2023.

The coordinators of the working groups also spoke in the session. They were Prof Bhavani Rao, UNESCO Chair for Gender Equality, Nidhi Goyal, Founder and Executive Director, Rising Flame, Jyotsna Mohan, Regional Coordinator (Asia), Asian Development Alliance and Dr Basavaraju R Shreshta, Executive Director of Grassroots Research And Advocacy Movement (GRAAM).

Nidhi highlighted during her speech, “It is important for us to focus on disabled people and inclusion of their experiences every step of the way to have our rights included and prioritised. We need to look at accessibility and reasonable accommodation. When we know that the world is constructed for a certain body and a certain kind of person. We often shift to say that the disabled person is to blame when the environment is not accessible.”

Nidhi ended with saying that we needed “to move from a space where we only have people with disabilities as part to seeing people with disabilities as leaders, as those who have inherent dignity and rights.”

Watch her full video here

Gender Equality and Disability (GED) Working Group

(National co-coordinators January to Mid April 2023)

More details available in the link.