My journey of education starts from Moravian Mission School, Leh till class 9th and then migrated for class 10th in Kendriya Vidyalaya School, Leh in 1995.  In 1997, and I have completed my higher education from Boys High Secondary School, Leh. With this, I have completed my schooling in Leh and like any other Ladakhi, I also moved to Chandigarh to pursue my graduation.

 

Without pursuing Post Graduation, I was in service for two years in Police Department, as a Sub Inspector in Anantnag.  After giving resignation from the service I prepared for Civil services and gave my first attempt or preliminary exam of KAS in 2005. The final result got declared in 2007.

 

 

Social welfare department is one of the main departments for the society. The department came into existence in Leh district in 1971, since then it has played an immense role in taking the responsibility of the weaker and vulnerable section of the society. The growing responsibility towards the downtrodden section of the society becomes a bit challenging because of the small strength of the department. 

 

Upliftment and assistance of poor, destitute, orphan disabled widow & senior citizen people are the objective and role of the department. For e.g. the construction of Bal Ashram to take care of all the children below the age of 18 years who are vulnerable. 

 

Thus, one of the roles of the social department is to identify the vulnerable section of the society as a senior citizen, children etc. to assist them.

 

 

Social welfare department shoulders the weaker and vulnerable section of the society. The department takes cares of destitute, orphans, disabled, widow & senior citizen who require special service. Different welfare schemes/ activities are implemented to provide assistance to the poor and ensure the development of Schedule Tribe & minority community & merit cum means scholarship to those students pursuing a degree or postgraduate technical or professional courses to enable students to fulfill their dreams.

 

 

There are many schemes under the Social Welfare Department.  We can divide the various schemes under different categories, namely,

 

 

National Social Assistance Programme NSAP-It is a centrally sponsored scheme for the people falling below the poverty line. This scheme has four components-

 

1. Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension (IGNOAP)- Eligibility- a person with 60 years of age and above who are below poverty line (BPL). The pension provided is Rs. 400 per month for 60-79 age and Rs 700 per month for the age group of 80 and above.

 

2. Indira Gandhi National Widow Pension Scheme (IGNWPS)- Eligibility – a widow who are between the ages 40-64 and belongs to BPL household. Pension provided is Rs.500 per month.

 

3. Indira Gandhi National Disability Pension Scheme (IGNDPS) - Eligibility- Person with severe or multiple disabilities between 18-64 years and belongs to the BPL family. Under the Person with Disability Act, the pension provided is Rs. 500 per month to the person who is 40% disable and fall in the age group of 80 years and above.

 

4. National Family Benefit Scheme -   Under this one-time financial assistance of Rs 20,000 is given to the family in case of death (Natural/Unnatural) of primary bread earner (Male/Female) of the family living under BPL.

 

 

Integrated Social Security Scheme (ISSS) - Under this financial assistance is being provided by the department to the old age person, widow or destitute women and physically handicapped.

Old Age Pension Scheme – under this scheme pension, is given to women of 55 years and men of 60 years and above who is BPL. The pension provided Rs. 200 per month.

 

Widow/ Destitute Women Pension: Financial Assistance of Rs. 200 per month is given to the widow or destitute women of any age group having no source of income.  

 

Physically Challenge Person: a person below the 18 years of age having a 40% and above disability certified by the medical board and with no source of income.  Pension provided is rs.400per month

 

 

Scholarship: Scholarship is provided to students belonging to Scheduled Tribe, Scheduled Caste, Minorities, Other backward classes categories from first standard to higher studies.

 

Special treatment outside the state- monetary assistance is provided to the poor person needing a specialized medical treatment outside the state.

 

Scheme for the person having chronic disease-Monetary assistance to the below poverty line patients who have to depend on medicine for their survival 

 

Training Programmes- Ladies Vocational centres, training in tailoring, cutting and embroidery is imparted to women in the age group of 15-40 years. This is imparted in order to train them to set up their own income generating unit.

 

Home for destitute and orphan- under this residential institution, are provided for the orphan, destitute and abandoned children. Children are provided with free schooling, including board and lodging facility. The two of the home care institute in Leh are Bal Ashram (for boys) and Nari Niketan (for girls).

 

 

It’s been disheartening to see not so much of schemes and facilities are there for specially-abled people.  But knowing the fact there should be many facilities and benefits schemes for the disabled people like provision of disabled friendly or accessibility in schools, hospital, restroom, transportation etc.  Presently, all the newly constructed buildings have facilities like the ramp, railings etc. As per disability act, all these provisions are rights of specially-abled people and it should be carried forward to them. 

 

The problem lies in the old already constructed buildings. In this case, making of all this facility becomes a problem, probably the cost and time.  As discussed before, we do have disability pension scheme. In collaboration with Education Department, Social Welfare department and NGO are like Pagir, Rewa etc. A camp was held in July where aid and equipment were distributed to the disable people and decision was taken to formulate a plan for the special people. Hopefully, in the coming years we can implement this plan into action. 

 

 

Pre metric and Post metric Scholarship for ST- this scheme is to award scholarship to students belonging to economically weaker sections of ST so as to provide them opportunities for higher education increase their rate of attainment in education and enhance their employability.

 

Pre metric Scholarship for ST- this scheme is newly implemented. Handled and managed by the education department. Eligibility: the annual income should not be above 2, 50,000.

 

Post metric scholarship for ST- this scheme is implemented by Social welfare department. Financial assistance is provided to the student pursuing post metric courses in Government or Private institution, which are recognized by the Government/UGC etc.The annual income should not exceed 2, 50,000

 

2. Scholarship schemes under Minority

 

Under this scheme financial assistance is provided to Minority i.e. Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Buddhist and Zoroastrians notified as Minority communities under Section 2(c) of the National Commissions for the Minorities Act, 1992.

 

Pre metric scholarship for minority- maximum students applies under this scheme. Students studying from 1st standard to 8th should go for the offline procedure, whereas, standard 9th and 10th needs to apply online.  The income criteria shouldn’t be above one lakh.

 

Post metric Scholarship for minority- the procedure to apply this scheme is online. The income of the family from all sources does not exceed ₹.2 lakh.

 

3. Scholarship for ST, SC and OBC- this scholarship is highly preferred by Government school student.  The procedure involved is very simple and easy.

 

Last year, around 1700 students are benefited.

 

Scholarship for Merit cum Means- Financial assistance will be given to pursue degree and or post graduate level technical & professional course from a recognised institution.

The entire above scholarship scheme is only applicable for two children of one family and can apply only one scheme from above.  Any student studying in Government or Private institution can apply, but the preference is given to the Govt. Institution 30% of scholarship is earmarked for the girl students.

 

 

The scholarship scheme is for every student studying in and outside Ladakh. Talking about Leh, I should say that if any student studying in Ladakh is not getting the scholarship, it’s my responsibility to enquire about it.  But on the other hand, the student studying outside should put their grievances in front of Ministry of tribal affairs. I am not authorized to discuss this matter.

 

 

It is true that we don’t have Juvenile home in Ladakh and is one of the important things that needs to be established in Ladakh. 

It becomes important because any children who commit crime needs to take separately. They shouldn’t be kept along with the other criminals. The first and the foremost thing are to understand and rehab them.

  

We can categorize the Juvenile into two categories-

 

Care and protection- as discussed above this is a home care facility for the destitute, orphan and abandoned the child.  Free lodging and education facility are given to these children. Example: Bal Ashram and Nari Niketan. 

 

Children in conflict with the law- there are many incident and crime cases in which children’s are involved. Those children shouldn’t be treated as criminal rather they should be taken as a child. In Juvenile home, these children are taken separately and rehab them, in order to shape them as a better person. 

 

A meeting was held with UNICEF –United Nations International Children Emergency Fund and Save the Children in collaboration with Social Welfare Department. The meeting was discussed and planned to start a scheme. They decided to make a comprehensive scheme in which both the categories will be taken into consideration.  This scheme comes under SRO76-Jammu and Kashmir Juvenile Justice Care & Protection Act of 2013. This has to be implementing soon and it’s disheartening that it is not started yet and we don’t even have one juvenile home. This didn’t come into implement because it needs very concrete studies, research and many clauses need to be added and removed. But it is in process and hopefully we could have one in coming years.

 

 

We have gone through many of the cases in which specially abled people are treated differently. The narrow-minded people in the society compelled these people to be left out isolated and dependent.  In many cases, proper medical treatment and facilities are not obtained because the family and society believes in keeping it as a secret because they are specially abled and the superstitious blind faith of the society. When we go out for the survey in the field, many don’t give the facts and hide up many things. 

 

The important thing is to integrate them. Every section of the society should encourage them to walk and stand together, treating equally without thinking as a stigma. The need is to change the attitude.

 

The provision of disabled friendly things and equipment in all the buildings, public transport is of prime importance. Nowadays newly constructed buildings have all the facility but the old buildings have the problem and issues. This can be the financial reason and time. The government should take responsibility & consider all this need.

 

Thus, whether it is the government or society, the most important thing is to uplift the people in need, giving equal status in the society and to make them self-reliant.