Introduction

Shadow Report to the Committee on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Shadow Report to the Committee on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

May 2018

India signed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (UNCRPD) in 2007.

The UNCRPD requires signing states to promote, protect, and ensure the full enjoyment of human rights by persons with disabilities.

Shadow Report to the Committee on the UNCRPD: Pooja Menon and Nidhi Goyal are in conversation with few people. Pooja is wearing a green kurta and Nidhi is in a red kurta while holding a laptop. They are talking to to four school children and a woman in a pink kurta. They are in a room with few chairs and a table. They are smiling.

 In 2019, India will come up for review before the UNCRPD committee, which will assess India’s progress towards promoting, protecting, and ensuring full enjoyment of human rights by persons with disabilities.

Part of the UNCRPD review involves soliciting reports from civil society that provide evidence to the committee on India’s progress and persistent challenges in advancing UNCRPD obligations.

Together with Shanta Memorial Rehabilitation Centre and women with disabilities India Network, Rising Flame has contributed to filing a report with the UN Committee, known as a shadow report that assesses India’s progress towards realizing Article 6 of UNCRPD, focused on realizing the rights of women and girls with disabilities. Documenting progress toward realizing Article 6 in Maharashtra, in May 2018, Rising Flame conducted two focus group discussions with 60 women with visual and locomotor disabilities, aimed at gathering information on the discrimination, violence, abuse that they face.

Srinidhi in discussion with four five students. The students are in a red uniform with a white dupatta. They are all sitting in a classroom that has several tables with sewing machines on them.
UNCRPD-Mumbai-May-2018: This is a photo of a banner which has been put up across two doors. The banner is white with a black outline. The SMRC logo is on the left side, in the middle it is the Commonwealth foundation and on the right is the Rising Flame logo. It has the following text: Workshop on Disability Rights for Women with Disabilities. Organised by Rising Flame in collaboration with Shanta Memorial Rehabilitation Center, Bhubaneswar with support of Commonwealth foundation