The disabled as an economic resource
Ajay Kela

Posted: Monday, Apr 30, 2012 at 0324 hrs IST

 India has a very unique talent pool of an estimated three million educated 
disabled. What makes them so unique? The educated disabled have demonstrated 
tremendous resilience and have been toughened by the challenges of inadequate 
school facilities, lack of accommodating transport infrastructure and yet have 
graduated from high schools and colleges. This segment of society reflects an 
enormous 'can-do' attitude and is equipped with tremendous staying power which 
corporate India can leverage. 

Corporate India could derive better business value in terms of higher 
productivity, reduced attrition and lowered training costs by employing this 
talented pool within existing corporate jobs. Today, the average employment 
rate of disabled people in the private sector is only 0.28%. The public sector 
showed an employment rate of 0.54% even though the population of the disabled 
in the country exceeds 6%. 

The inherent reasons for the lack of sensitivity on behalf of the corporate 
sector are a matter of concern. But, it hasn't helped that the government too 
has fallen behind its plans. 'Scheme of Incentives to Employers in the Private 
Sector for providing Employment to Persons with Disabilities (PwD)', which was 
launched in 2008, was meant to create 1,00,000 jobs annually for the disabled. 
It has barely created a few hundred. The ministry of social justice and 
empowerment also seems unable to motivate the private sector through incentives 
that encourage the employment of the disabled. The government has agreed to 
reimburse the employers' contribution to the provident fund for disabled 
employees earning up to R25,000 for the first three years. R1,800 crore was 
sanctioned for this scheme under the 11th Five Year Plan. The revised estimate 
for 2009-10 was R3 crore, of which only R1 crore was released. 

The orthodox routes of disability management focused around welfare, 
reservations, concessions, subsidies and other short-term practices have 
clearly failed to deliver results. India has a large and unique population of 
educated disabled with excellent leadership skills, staying capacity and 
unparalleled productivity. Can the past be set aside and can corporate India 
realise the business value of the three million educated disabled? 

Large enterprises with foresight and taking a cue from western world, where the 
disabled fare are already part of the mainstream, are working towards 
leveraging this positive slice of the demographic pie. Companies such as Wipro, 
Tata, Mindtree, GenPact, Symphony Services and Mphasis have recognised that the 
disabled can solve many persistent human resource problems and are hiring the 
disabled in encouraging numbers. 

Across all sectors companies can employ people with disabilities that map to 
specific jobs. For instance, the BPO industry has greater than 50% attrition of 
current employees due to mismatch of job aspirations. Back-end data processing 
can be handled by majority of physically disabled or those with speech and 
hearing impairment. 

Recently, Gitanjali Gems Ltd announced a training centre in Hyderabad that 
would provide jobs to 1,000 PwDs. Others are creating similar examples in a bid 
to use a resource that has so far remained hidden. Today's economy has the 
ability to deliver a win-win solution for the disabled in society and for 
corporate India. 

Businesses have begun to recognise the wealth that exists in PwDs. They are 
putting in place processes and support systems that can fine-tune this talent 
to meet their needs. It is a momentous change silently taking place within the 
folds of corporate India. 

Organisations like the Wadhwani Foundation are propelling the change with their 
mission of mainstreaming the educated disabled in corporate India. The 
Foundation is driving training and placement of 1,00,000 disabled (in five 
years) into sustainable high quality jobs within corporate India. They hope 
that the companies will recognise the business value through these initial 
hires and recruit the remaining educated millions, making it a self-sustaining 
model. The Foundation works with companies to identify functional areas and 
required competencies for potential jobs within the enterprise; it then 
recruits and trains candidates in these competencies; and finally it 
facilitates placement and provides post-placement support to the company and 
the candidate. By matching skills to abilities of disabled candidates and 
providing targeted, market -linked vocational training that is relevant to the 
needs of employers, it enables PwDs to offer higher quality of work over a 
sustained period of time. The Foundation's approach, which is replicable, has 
delivered success in a wide variety of industries such as business process 
outsourcing, remote infrastructure management, retail sales and facilities 
management. 

On the other hand, industry bodies such as Nasscom have established programmes 
to pursue their member companies to make offices disabled friendly and are 
conducting advocacy campaigns around business value of employing the disabled. 

Today's corporate responsibilities are being redefined and businesses must work 
towards better integration with the societies they serve. As corporate India 
becomes more sensitised and addresses the needs of the disabled to create 
sustainable business advantage, this is going to be one of the most significant 
trends of the decade. 

The author is president & CEO, Wadhwani Foundation

     

http://www.financialexpress.com/news/the-disabled-as-an-economic-resource/943345/0
 

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