Census Reports: 27% of differently-abled children have never been to school

2.6 million Differently -abled children have never been to school: 2011 census

Nearly 2.6 million of the differently-abled children have either did not see the inside of a school or had to drop out, a report on the 2011 census which was released on Monday said.

The report said only four million — 61% of the India’s 6.6 million has disabled population in the 5-19 age group — were studying at an educational institution in the year 2011.

The proportion of children who are studying in a school was higher for the total population by a 10 percentage points (71%).

Of the rest, 27% (1.75 million) children with any special needs have never attended any school, while 12% (0.8 million) had dropped out of school.

What the census report stated?

The census report said that the proportion of disabled children, who had never ever attended any educational institution, was the highest among people with the multiple disability (54.4%) which was followed by mental illness (50.3%) and mental retardation (41.2%).

Persons with any other disability (17.7%) show the least percentage.

Worldwide, the International Disability and the Development Consortium report have said about 32.2 million school-age children with disabilities were kept out of the classroom.

Further, the lack of access to education for the disabled is also reflected in the lower literacy rates for them.

Across all the age groups, the census report had said that the literacy rate among the disabled (which had reportedly increased from 49% in the year 2001 to 54.5% in 2011) was much lower than the overall literacy rate of 74%.

At 68%, the census has also reported a higher literacy rate for the disabled in some of the urban areas than in rural areas (49%).

Also, the difference in the literacy rate between the males and females is wider in rural than in urban areas.

However, the government should work upon this and encourage the parents to send their differently-abled kids to school.