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This file was generated by Descript <www.descript.com>

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Anita: Okay.

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So let me begin right from the start, I think.

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I had polio when I was two years old, so you can say that I had no memory of actually having an able body as such, in that sense.

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So whatever I know or I have known or will get to know, I think in one sense, disability has played a very, very important role in my understanding of various, you could say, perspectives, issues, people, in that sense.

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And born to a family where they come from Partition, so I'm also the first generational learner.

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So, my father was about 15 or so, and mom must have been six or seven, and then they got married in '56.

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Just to put it in order.

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So they were, you could say, in a poor bracket, in that particular sense.

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And they got the place where I stay was the claim that was given by the government after Partition, in that sense.

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And he was a very good student, but could finish matriculation in a private way.

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And my mother couldn't chime in, so both lost their fathers in Pakistan itself.

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She was two years old when she lost her father and dad lost his father when he was about eight or nine.

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So, dependent upon others in that particular sense.

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So, education in that particular sense for them was not like this thing.

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So I think for us, and especially for me, having acquired a disease at that time called polio, initially of course, it began with a lot of attempts to cure, which is always the thing, which you try your best.

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I won't go into details about that.

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I've written about it, of course.

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But that is where I think for him, education became very, very important because for me to become self independent and to be on my own, I think it was very important for him to educate me.

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And the first few years, of course, they were really trying to...

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The cure was dependent upon lot of shamans, mystics, doctors, everything combined together, what Sudhir Kakar would always say, in that sense.

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But after that, I think he really gave up and he said that no, studies are important, and in that sense education became the key in that sense.

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I can’t say that I became…I was really…There was a lot of overcoming for people who were growing up like that in the '50s, late, '58 I was born in and '60s or whatever.

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'60s, primarily polio was very, very, both in America, India, Russia, everywhere.

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A lot of people who had this thing.

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So in one particular sense, it was looking at it, how integrated education was something which they were looking for.

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And it was basically, you can say in '68, I think, the Kothari Commission report came up for education.

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And the Kothari Commission actually said that they were, although of course they had the word called “handicapped,” which of course now we use it as a derogatory word in that sense.

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But they had this whole thing about that they should go to a "normal school" and they must be integrated within that particular school for education.

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And they always had, and this is very interesting, all these policies, whether Kothari Commission or the first education, '86, '92, wherever.

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They had this whole thing about formal and informal, because they knew that they would not be able to educate everyone.

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I think they had this whole thing where knew that they would not be able to educate everyone.

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So when we say educate everyone, it means that even, we're talking about children with disabilities, they knew that they would not be able to take children who were the able body children, they would not be able to educate them.

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They still have not educated them.

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If you have read anything from that Professor Anil Sadgopal has done a lot of work where he used to bring in the neighborhood school systems and all that.

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And where he used to say that how every education policy, there's something that is...

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Underwriting is there.

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They knew.

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And they used to say that people are stupid, they don't understand, but it wasn't like that.

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It is always because they know that this thing will happen.

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And there is something which is unwritten out there, but which was very clear that they will not be able to get it, in that sense.

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And they will not able to really educate, either able bodied children also and disabled children of course, is very far from there.

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We'll come to that later, but very far from there, in that sense.

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And I remember, just as an example, I'm trying to tell you that I was in an almost you could say decent school, and the class teacher…so trying to tell you that how the attitudinal domain really played a very important role.

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So, you know what would happen was that there were times when you had to go to the toilet and the corridor was slightly different.

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And I had the crutches and I also had the back for–the calipers of course were there–and the back belt was also there.

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So it was slightly difficult to, one could walk slowly and whatever, but she would, supposedly if I had to say that I had to go to the toilet, she would always think that I'm trying to get away from the class.

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So going to the toilet was one way of doing it.

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And I remember once she gave me the permission when it was just in the nick of the time, and so much so that I soiled in the corridor, and then of course, there was a lady who used to help us all.

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But this was not the end of the trauma because when I came in, she actually made the students who were there, the classmates who were there, she made them recite that, "Shame, shame, poppy, shame, all the children know your name."

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And when I came home, my parents realized what had happened.

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He had taken me out from that school, and he said that I'm not going to let her go into that school where such attitudes, which was a negative attitude.

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Obviously, I was the disabled child and the other were not disabled in that particular sense, but this is something which always stays with me, that how when you teach children with disabilities, how the teaching part also, how it stigmatizes the children as well.

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When the adults themselves have no sensitivity and no perspective where they can say that disability can happen to anyone and anytime.

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It's not like only in India or only in America or only in whatever rural area.

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It can happen to anyone.

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It can happen to any gender.

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It can happen to any class, any caste.

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I would say that all these constituencies that are there, disability and disability is not like...

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There was a time when one would think that, oh hereditary is important, that is responsible, but it isn't actually, because there are landmines, there are bomb blasts, there are disasters, natural, as well as manmade or whatever.

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So, the accidents that are there in Delhi, I mean, every three minutes, there's an accident.

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So you could say that disability is something which is not known.

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I mean, disability should be known very well in that particular sense.

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And yet.

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And yet, I would say that the playing field, it was where they are to be put in what we call it as the special schools.

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And I think since you read my piece on globalizing, I have discussed this sandwiching of both the integrated education or the inclusive education, they call it, and also the special education.

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Initially it was called the social welfare and later, of course the word was empowerment.

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So I don't know whether the word only changed, semantics changed or whether the life also changed.

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I can't say that nothing happened.

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Of course, lot of things that happened, but I think education per se for children with disabilities has been a serious concern, in that sense.

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Let me say, can you tell us the story of how you came to this work?

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So that's how I was trying to say that.

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So, slowly of course it was a very overcoming, inspirational kind of a thing.

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That, okay, fine, you must overcome disability, you must be brave, all these things were there.

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It was only when I did my class 11, class 12 was not there at that time, class 12 was the next year after that, '76.

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But I went to be IP, Indraprastha College.

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One of the very, very, oldest college and the very famous college in that sense.

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But there the teachers were completely different.

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Lot of sensitivity and lot of, although there were problems because I was in the hostel because they couldn't really, I was about, you can say about 28 kilometers from my home in Delhi, that is lot of, at that time, really a lot of distance.

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So my parents put me in the hostel and the hostel had an Indian toilet.

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I'm not saying my house had a disabled friendly toilet, but my mother had a kind of a commode and something like that, where I would be comfortable in that particular sense.

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But in the college itself, there was an Indian toilet and the first week of my hostel stay, I came and I used to have a dog at that time.

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Her name was Jimmy.

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And I said that she gets better food, and I told my father that I'm not to going to go.

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So he said that there's no other way.

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So either you want to be educated or you don't want to be educated, that is for you to decide.

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So I think I went back, but the idea was because you were in the hostel and all that, so slowly one got used to whatever.

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And thankfully one started...

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I took up psychology at that time, and I was interested in the course and did very well in that particular sense.

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And the post graduation of course happens in the campus, the north campus, Delhi.

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So he realized that now, even if I send her to the hostel, there's no point because from there I will have to come to the north campus for the classes.

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So then I came home and by that time he was doing better than what was there earlier.

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So I used to have that very, very secondhand fear, which I think when it used to rain, it would stop and whatever.

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But it was comfortable at least to go to this thing.

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But what had happened was that after post graduation and just to brag that I was a topper, both for BA as well as MA, and all of us at that time, somehow or the other we were very keen on taking the civil services exams, which we thought that I can take it and whatever.

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But when I went in to take the form, the clerk was there, he said that, "For whom do you want the form?"

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So I said, "Myself."

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So he said, "No, no, you can't, there's only six by six corrected glasses, otherwise you are handicapped.

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So you can't."

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So you can see that, mind was okay, but body wasn't.

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And how the dualism, in that sense, was not thought of, it was almost as if body separate and mind is separate.

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So big deal if mind is sharp, but the mind could not have gone in and taken a civil services exam.

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I am so glad that I didn't go to the civil services.And I taught, and I think I'm really glad, but that was the idea at that time where I realized that look, whether people accept me as "normal," inspirational or whatever the words are, but I cannot get away from the identity that I am in one particular sense, disabled.

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And at that time, even the disabled part was not there with me, I must have said handicapped again at that time, which would've been there.

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And I remember we thought of going for a trip or something, and I was walking out from Miranda to college.

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And I just simply said that nobody's ever whistled at me.

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Now as a teacher, I would've cried blue murder that teasing and all that, everything.

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I would've gone against all those, but at that time, what was coming to my mind was that there was no conceptualization of a womanhood when you are with calipers, when you are with crutches and your identity is that of a person who just cannot walk, that's the thing there.

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And also this whole dilemma that whether you want it or you don't want, it's there.

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It's part and parcel of your life in that sense.

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And incidentally, IP college has had people like Kumkum Sangari, Sudesh Baid, Uma Chakravarti, would come up very often and all that.

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So there was this whole understanding of, at that time, the women's movement.

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And also the fact that you want to be in the women's movement to look at issue like dowry at that time, dowry debts and all that, in teasing and all that, and one was really interested in these things, but slowly when I went onto that, and by that time, I think in almost '81, I started teaching in IP, which was a temporary job, but then finally I went to JMC in '84, Jesus and Mary College, and I got a permanent post to start teaching out there.

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But I started realizing that even within the women's movement, there was a lot of, of course, there were many problems.

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I can't say that, considering that you are in India, there are a whole lot of issues that are needed, in that sense to be resolved, which of course, resolution is not always possible, but in some sense, disability was not a feature, which was there for the women's movement as well.

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And I think it was at that particular, and I'm not going in a linear way, I'm just trying to do my best to give you a sense of whatever.

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But slowly there was…Javed Abidi, who is no more, but was an activist and really wanted to come up with this disability rights group and all.

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And from there, we started doing, and the work actually started on employment and not really education at that time.

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And the education at that time was only for those who could at least reach there, and which was mostly for example, mobility impaired, and also blind.

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Because at least with the escort they could reach wherever they could in that sense and there were a lot of Delhi had hostels for the blind and also in one particular sense, they were trying to know and these people would come from the villages and all, but at least would get their education and in that sense, it was something.

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And by that time, they started looking at the categories of the jobs, A, B, C, D and all that but it took a lot of time.

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But 1981 was the international year of the disabled and I think that opened up some doors where you thought that it will be better to understand some parts and how we can kind of work in the sense towards creating awareness about disability, how the language kind of changed, one would kind of say “person with disability” and the person who was important and all.

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And somehow when I say what body of work, I mean, as such, there was nothing which was there on disability studies.

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That took long time.

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I mean it has almost taken 20 years, I think 20, no, maybe more than that, but what did happen was that at least we were trying to somehow or the other...

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There were various things, like I remember the center for advocacy research, where we tried getting a representation of disability in the media.

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As channels started coming up and we realized that it's important and yet we realized that, of course, once we were fighting for the representation, but then we realized that the representations were so negative in one sense that one would have to think many times as to whether you really want the representations or not in that sense.

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And also I think what I was doing at that time, let me just simply kind of say that in M.A.

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and in M.Phil and in Ph.D.

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I worked on various, for example, in M.A.

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I had different kind of disabilities and I would try to look at their problems, the life satisfaction and also how they would understand what their self esteem is and issues such as those.

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And then M.Phil I worked on the employment, open employment, as well as sheltered employment in that particular sense and so was Ph.D.

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and Ph.D.

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was a follow up, where I went to Bombay, I stayed with a particular school in which they had these young adults, intellectually impaired, where they would try to work and because of that, we would try to see that how much of them can come up into the open employment and that became a really important thing.

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So up till then, I think the idea was that to move ahead, educate...

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I mean, employment is important, but then came slowly the thought that how many of us actually get educated in that sense.

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Like I said, that I was the first generational learner and many of my fellow disabled were also like that, or some of them were educated.

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I mean, the parents were educated and whatever, but they were sent into wherever they could and all these things happen.

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But I think the idea that what exactly is this whole conceptualization of education and disability at that time and I was in...

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The UGC had done something on what was called the Lokshala, it was a program where they thought that they would work in different villages as well as it would be on primarily how to enhance the education of all children.

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Both.

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I mean, like I said, quote unquote normal and the disabled, and I thought that I would...

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This is somewhere in ‘97, right and ‘97 there was a deputation which I got where I said that I could work at the different villages where I would...

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I went to Northeast, I went to Maharashtra, I went to Calcutta, then to South India.

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I mean different, different places and initial thing used to be that when you went to a village, you would realize that...

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And when you ask them that, "Are there disabled children who are being educated out here?"

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They would say, "There's no disabled child out here," so which would take...

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I mean, I would be surprised and then I would say, can we take a round, we'll take a walk and went on to different...

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door to door thing and then we'd find that there were some which were hidden.

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There were some which were being educated and not educated.

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So I think it was from there that the idea about education came to me and I thought that my God, I mean on the first employment was important, but I think before employment, I think education was very, very important in that particular sense.

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Now, by that time, the legislation had given them a reservation.

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Like Dalit groups like caste, I mean, like SCST and whatever.

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So for disabled, they had about 3% reservation and that was to be given in the colleges.

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Now, this became very interesting for me because I said that...

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And we tried to kind of look at the seats and we found that Delhi University would have maybe about 800 seats if they were to calculate them including colleges and including different universities, but there were about 300 to be taken and all, but how?

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What shook me was that you are reserving in higher education, right.

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But how do we come to higher education, if you haven't done the Class 12.

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You have to do a class 12 and it's only then you can come and be reserved in the...

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you might get a reservation in the colleges and all, but what about the school education?

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And I think school education became a very, very serious, I think, task where one would kind of say that, "Will it be that we will stay only like the premier institutions like CIE in Delhi, Lady Irwin College” and all.

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I mean, all of them, they would say that, "Well, you have an optional course” and that optional course would be education of either “differently abled” or “differently challenged.” Now these are the kind of names, I mean, euphemisms.

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I think, which can be far too many, I mean, which are there or “special children.” I mean there taught something of course, which I hate with a passion, okay, because I used to feel that everybody's special.

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I mean, every child is special, I mean, for sake of parents I think children are important, children are special.

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So why is it that these special children whose teachers also don't get that much money, even as teachers, as the other teachers are there.

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They are paid less as compared to when they are in the so-called normal ones, but then by that time, of course, what is now known as AADI was the Spastics Society at that time.

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Again the names changed, I mean, I know wherever it was then, but that was to convey that there is a different meaning to also the conceptualization of disability or in that sense.

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So they started and AADI on its own started teaching courses which were for example, I would teach them.

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I wouldn't charge, I would just simply go and teach them, like for example Piaget and how you would kind of understand a lifespan.I mean, [K.

00:32:16.300 --> 00:32:29.950
Anders] Ericsson or Colberg, I mean different kind of understanding which was there and how education or Bronfenbrenner, that how education of children with disabilities, how they can be located there in that sense.

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So in one sense the different models started coming up to you, but came up to me, but it was also before ‘97.

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In ’96 for the first time I went to...

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It just so happened that I was went through kind of a very, very, you could say a depressing personal level stage where you realize that your own relationship with the, I mean, other people like a boyfriend at that time or a breakup or the realization.

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I mean, I can just give you one example so that it will help in understanding again, the attitude.

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Where, I mean, I do remember this guy who was very...

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I mean, we were close but he fractured his foot and it was like his birthday was close or something like that, and so they gave him that walking crutch thing, what you call it as, or the walking foot as they call it and so I just said that let's go for the lunch and let's go do...

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So he said, "Why you want to be you'll be mutually embarrassed."

00:33:56.280 --> 00:34:04.470
Now when I heard the word mutually embarrassed, I just kind of said that, "What you say, I mean, that."

00:34:05.050 --> 00:34:21.730
And he said that "We all psychologists," and he knew that I had a psychoanalytical orientation at one level and so he said, "It's always because you're trying to find words, meaning."

00:34:21.980 --> 00:34:25.170
I said, "No, I think it means something else also.

00:34:25.929 --> 00:34:32.790
It means that you always have felt that I feel, you feel embarrassed when you have to take me out."

00:34:33.239 --> 00:34:37.469
And I realized that it's enough.

00:34:37.780 --> 00:34:40.850
I mean, I can't carry on with that.

00:34:41.270 --> 00:34:50.610
And I think it was this particular thing which my father said that "You've done so well in M.Phil also and Ph.D."

00:34:50.850 --> 00:35:05.689
so he given me as a trip and I was with my cousin in New York and I actually managed to find that there was a society for disability studies which was in Washington.

00:35:06.270 --> 00:35:11.450
I didn't know how I would go or where I would stay and all, but I told them that I would manage.

00:35:11.510 --> 00:35:17.110
I mean you just let me go and they said that, "You can take a bus and that Greyhound thing.

00:35:17.389 --> 00:35:18.850
Then I would kind of whatever.”

00:35:19.469 --> 00:35:34.030
And there I met all these people, I mean, who became almost like my friends, who was like Michael Oliver, Barnes, Mairian Corker.

00:35:34.070 --> 00:35:47.170
Mairian Corker was a deaf scholar and she was someone, I mean, I always feel sad that she died so soon, but I think she was someone.

00:35:47.180 --> 00:36:10.820
Susan Gable, I mean, who works on education and Mairian put me on as a book reviewer so that I could get the books, because the books used to be so expensive and so she said that, "You will be able to get this thing," and by chance, I happened to.

00:36:10.820 --> 00:36:15.229
By that time the computer was starting to come into that.

00:36:15.570 --> 00:36:20.480
So although of course it was with the Windows and the Winsock and all that.

00:36:20.480 --> 00:36:30.920
We had to do a lot of problem, but we could start writing or whatever and it was there that there was somebody known as Sally French.

00:36:30.920 --> 00:36:42.870
I don't know whether you know about her or not, very good scholar and she kind of said that, "Anita, I can pay for the whatever postage and all, but these are secondhand books."

00:36:43.260 --> 00:36:46.830
So I said, "Sally, I mean, how does it make a difference?

00:36:48.420 --> 00:36:50.700
Maximum they've been marked somewhere or whatever.

00:36:54.010 --> 00:37:00.590
I would cherish them if you can send," and it was almost like a...

00:37:00.960 --> 00:37:30.119
I can't say charitable, but I mean, it was a real empathy where she could sense that this particular scholar wants to know and read all the stuff, and it was, I think, at that particular juncture that I got some of the books that came to me and some, of course, I would try to go into the libraries.

00:37:30.779 --> 00:37:40.689
There the library used to be on the third floor and you would go and you will find that one journal was torn somewhere and you wouldn't find the pages.

00:37:40.969 --> 00:37:45.720
I mean, this was what was the scenario even at that time, in that sense.

00:37:46.199 --> 00:37:55.509
But I think by that time, I think my interest in somewhere writing about disability, thinking about disability.

00:37:55.960 --> 00:38:19.700
And it was in 2002 that Mark Priestley from UK Leeds University asked me to write a chapter and I also could write a piece which is actually known as seminal piece, which is Disabled Women: Excluded Part of Feminism.

00:38:19.710 --> 00:38:38.270
It's a paper which is very well known, which came up in 2002 and I wrote another piece, which was for Kaleidoscope where somebody who has an Indian and had a daughter who was in intellectually impaired and I wrote on mythology.

00:38:38.670 --> 00:38:59.930
So I think that gave me a setup from where I started writing and I started, and I wrote on the third world and I wrote on poverty and gender primarily, and education of children with disabilities, I mean, and that's it.

00:39:00.170 --> 00:39:18.770
By that time, I lost my father in 2001 and then I got a postdoc fellowship for a year and it was in 2003 that [Dis]Embodied Form: Issues of Disabled Women was my first book that came out.

00:39:19.290 --> 00:39:25.600
Now, by that time, I think I actually reached a level where I had...

00:39:25.600 --> 00:39:52.406
I mean, where I started working not only on education, but I started also working on gender per se and in that particular sense, I mean, I remember Kamla Bhasin, we've just lost her, but I remember that she once said that, "Anita," or I don't know whether you know Hindi or not, but I will translate it.

00:39:52.406 --> 00:40:09.489
“Aurat hona sabse badi disability hai.” So “being a woman is the biggest disability” and I responded back and I said, "Kamlaji, that means that you can understand the womanhood through disabling parts, right.

00:40:10.260 --> 00:40:23.366
But you are not willing to actually look at the analogy of understanding disability through whatever the...

00:40:23.366 --> 00:40:29.759
I mean, whether it was the emancipatory part or the oppressive part, whatever is there, but you're not understanding that particular part."

00:40:30.090 --> 00:40:48.940
I think that was somewhere where I think it gave me some idea that we must…and I was by that time doing a B.El.Ed., BA in Elementary Education and I was working on that and with that, I brought in...

00:40:49.360 --> 00:40:57.370
I mean, somewhere I wrote a piece which's called Being in Shadow of My Own Disability, I think something like that.

00:40:57.850 --> 00:41:21.920
I've forgotten now, but was a very, very well received piece and that was given to almost all the colleges that were taking up and we took up then the issues of caste, issues of religion like Azra writing on being a Muslim, on being a Dalit, like that.

00:41:21.929 --> 00:41:25.059
I think taking up all and trying to see.

00:41:25.069 --> 00:41:30.911
I'm not sure whether we had exactly the word intersection at that time, but we were trying to do that.

00:41:30.911 --> 00:41:30.914
I mean, trying to understand the different...

00:41:30.914 --> 00:41:53.760
And something which I was really, really against and that was the add on categories where they would say that gender, caste, civility, et cetera and I would say that, "What is the big idea?"

00:41:54.320 --> 00:42:04.750
If you're going to be [inaudible] different constituencies, then how do I understand and it brought me to education also.

00:42:05.860 --> 00:42:27.551
There's some part which I've written in the Globalizing Data Education: A Globalizing Era, where I've written that if you can say that a disabled, poor girl in the rural area, who's also a Dalit, you know you can't say that.

00:42:27.579 --> 00:42:31.370
There are so many markers and how are you going to take which marker?

00:42:31.620 --> 00:42:33.379
Which marker are you going to attend to it?

00:42:33.659 --> 00:42:39.819
I mean, in that particular sense, it became very, very important for me.

00:42:40.920 --> 00:42:46.290
Let me catch my breath for a minute, yeah.

00:42:47.040 --> 00:42:48.610
Can I have some water please?

00:42:50.750 --> 00:42:51.250
Is it okay?

00:42:51.550 --> 00:42:51.840
I mean…

00:42:53.990 --> 00:42:54.550
Vishesh: Yes, yes.

00:42:54.550 --> 00:42:55.130
That's lovely.

00:42:55.139 --> 00:43:09.659
I'm enjoying it and I think this is a big part of the kind of story we'd love to hear, get a sense of how to arrive at these thinkings and also generally get a sense of the trajectory of things that have been.

00:43:10.330 --> 00:43:15.750
Anita: Yeah, just two seconds I'll take, and then I'll..

00:43:15.750 --> 00:43:18.060
Vishesh: Absolutely, no rush at all.

00:43:18.380 --> 00:43:20.009
Anita: Yeah, no, no.

00:43:20.010 --> 00:43:30.340
I'm quite used to be the teacher so two hours is all right, I'll let you know but still a break is important, I think.

00:43:30.629 --> 00:43:38.020
No, I think I had gone up to maybe the fourth, fifth question from youth in schools, homes and other...

00:43:38.400 --> 00:43:38.870
This, I must say.

00:43:38.870 --> 00:43:49.139
So they also started working on this education in home, something that I was really taken aback.

00:43:49.420 --> 00:43:56.919
I mean, I said that, " Does it mean that we will never come out of the room or in our home, houses?"

00:43:57.110 --> 00:43:58.160
You will teach them.

00:43:58.890 --> 00:44:10.710
And also let me bring up the new education policy out here which has come up in 20 and you know why.

00:44:12.800 --> 00:44:19.180
Look at how COVID has been doing things.

00:44:19.520 --> 00:44:22.919
Not only in India, I think elsewhere also.

00:44:23.580 --> 00:44:27.865
Whatever needs to be done has been done because people are not there.

00:44:27.870 --> 00:44:32.379
There are online classes and there are teachers are not there and all, so there's nobody...

00:44:32.440 --> 00:44:34.879
Like an old lady saying what they want to say.

00:44:34.879 --> 00:45:11.100
But the new policy actually, they accept disability but actually is trying to say that completely privatization that is coming up and when you are going to bring privatization, where are the poor children who are also disabled going to be and they also in the policy they've taken up that one particular...

00:45:11.380 --> 00:45:24.160
All the groups that are somewhere socially, I mean, you could say not I'm simply forgetting the-

00:45:24.529 --> 00:45:25.799
Vishesh: Marginalized or?

00:45:25.980 --> 00:45:31.049
... Anita: marginalized categories, but they've made it all together which means that...

00:45:32.609 --> 00:45:55.750
I mean, as if everything will be changed once you give them whatever, that particular categorization of marginalization and exclusion in that sense, but how would you actually, along with privatization, how would you give them the education in that particular sense?

00:45:56.060 --> 00:46:05.259
By that time, the legislation which was there in '96 had already started.

00:46:06.389 --> 00:46:09.040
People were upset because there were seven disabilities.

00:46:09.410 --> 00:46:13.450
People were also trying to say that there are more disabilities than that.

00:46:13.880 --> 00:46:19.950
And there were people who were trying to say that the gender component was not there.

00:46:19.950 --> 00:46:23.670
There were 28 chapters, not one chapter had gender in it.

00:46:23.900 --> 00:46:39.799
So Professor Sadgopal would often say that two third of the children who are out actually are girls because they would never reach school in that particular sense.

00:46:40.139 --> 00:46:42.480
And many of them would be disabled also, right?

00:46:42.480 --> 00:46:44.100
In that sense.

00:46:44.830 --> 00:46:47.020
And I also feel that somewhere you kind of...

00:46:47.080 --> 00:46:57.879
And then the RTE, the Right to Education, that also came up before that the Congress had brought.

00:46:58.230 --> 00:47:09.009
And that also was the EWS, the poor section, 25% and out of that, they would take children and who would be whatever, some poor and some disabled.

00:47:09.649 --> 00:47:28.239
So it was almost like never giving a chance where a child would have a right to be educated in a school where they can be entered without any issues, without any problems.

00:47:28.349 --> 00:47:44.600
And also India knows, of course there is a lot of differentiation between the public education, the private education and also the government education, in that particular sense.

00:47:44.820 --> 00:47:52.700
Of course, there's some thoughts about Delhi, at least with AAP, they say that education has become better and all that.

00:47:53.120 --> 00:48:01.689
But when you talk about children with disabilities are not sure whether they've really taken them in that particular sense.

00:48:01.940 --> 00:48:25.810
But by that time in 2016, when the parliament was being broken up every 20 minutes and all, they all decided, and that's something again, a charitable mode, where they said that each party said that, let's pass the 2016 bill which was for the disability, person's with disability.

00:48:26.870 --> 00:48:31.790
And that gave something like a 4% reservation.

00:48:32.270 --> 00:48:36.140
That was the only question that they asked, there was no debate.

00:48:36.869 --> 00:48:43.700
For about 10 minutes they took, and the bill was passed and the only question that came up was about the reservation.

00:48:44.000 --> 00:48:45.023
What was the reservation?

00:48:45.270 --> 00:48:46.310
Like that kind of a thing.

00:48:47.310 --> 00:49:12.180
So you can imagine, how we are…if you look at actually the data, data of course is disaggregated in one sense, and also even if you look at the NHRD data, nowhere you will find that children with disabilities are educated this much, this much, nowhere.

00:49:12.400 --> 00:49:18.450
You always have to search for it, that how many of them are being educated.

00:49:18.860 --> 00:49:39.569
But by and large, you can say that even if you take a very optimistic stance, I can tell you that if they were hundred children, they would be almost 15% who are being educated.

00:49:40.450 --> 00:49:49.739
The rest, sometimes up till class five, then maybe given up that and then class eight or after that, whatever.

00:49:52.719 --> 00:49:54.479
People say that children have been dropped.

00:49:55.049 --> 00:50:05.910
I always say that they've been pushed out because there's only one way when you talk about it, you talk about push out, that how they can be pushed out.

00:50:06.279 --> 00:50:13.480
Because if the access in itself, some of the ramps are jokes.

00:50:13.560 --> 00:50:27.480
If you look at the slopes which are there, and you find that you can't even, even if I have motorized wheelchair, even I can't reach and it's so scary.

00:50:27.680 --> 00:50:32.880
But these were a kind of tokenistic level that, okay, ramps have been done.

00:50:33.300 --> 00:50:47.760
But beyond ramps things like how the software such as JAWS or sign language, and I'm not saying that this hasn't happened, it has happened.

00:50:48.430 --> 00:51:00.870
But what I would to say about education is that there has been completely an abdication of education by the state.

00:51:01.020 --> 00:51:10.399
And state has never really gone into seriously, has never thought about teaching disabled children.

00:51:10.670 --> 00:51:25.830
It's always, they're encouraging, and then I call it sometimes in a funny way and also in a sarcastic way, the completely the NGO-ization which is there.

00:51:26.310 --> 00:51:35.000
Because that is where they would say that, okay, fine, give it to the NGOs and they would educate whatever is there.

00:51:35.809 --> 00:51:49.509
And that in itself would become one of the major, you can say, instrument in which the education was happening in many instances.

00:51:57.870 --> 00:52:08.819
We did get educated, but then we means that in a class of 36, 1 person was, I was there.

00:52:08.819 --> 00:52:24.650
Like that in each class, not in each class, I would say in maybe three, four, one a child would be educated in that particular sense, but not all schools.

00:52:25.360 --> 00:52:35.809
It isn't as if you can go and get children generally in the schools that they're there and you can find them anywhere, that's not there, that is something.

00:52:35.809 --> 00:52:37.870
Now, let me think about the higher education.

00:52:40.170 --> 00:52:50.860
My university, I shifted from Delhi university to Ambedkar University because I wanted to work on disability studies in that sense.

00:52:51.710 --> 00:53:07.649
And the vice chancellor was very, very serious in bringing disability studies into Ambedkar University.

00:53:07.669 --> 00:53:15.750
And they had these things like fee waivers and whole lot of things.

00:53:16.080 --> 00:53:24.559
But then compared to that, this university the building is a very old one.

00:53:24.810 --> 00:53:30.640
So difficult that first a week when I went, I didn't know how to go to the toilet.

00:53:30.640 --> 00:53:41.249
So he told me that you can get the ramps which would be placed out there at different places, which I did.

00:53:41.249 --> 00:53:49.020
There was almost like a card lunch that, okay, fine, do whatever you want to do, in that sense.

00:53:49.690 --> 00:54:00.910
But I could sense that maximum number of disabled children who have come to my class are about maybe five in 40.

00:54:01.000 --> 00:54:10.320
One we have given fee waivers, but how?

00:54:10.840 --> 00:54:17.089
See, once again, the idea of the playing field is not there at all.

00:54:17.900 --> 00:54:26.370
The idea that from where you will come, you always say that Metro is very disabled-friendly.

00:54:26.440 --> 00:54:27.240
Yeah, it is.

00:54:27.900 --> 00:54:33.060
Metro is disabled-friendly, but what about the last mile connectivity?

00:54:34.879 --> 00:54:40.550
How do you reach Metro?

00:54:42.750 --> 00:54:49.790
And if you have to reach Metro, is there, okay, so there are some scooters and there're some buses and all, but are those disabled-friendly?

00:54:50.000 --> 00:54:50.280
No.

00:54:52.029 --> 00:54:59.570
So in one particular sense, some parts are disabled-friendly and some parts are not disabled-friendly.

00:55:00.130 --> 00:55:19.160
But some of the NGOs, like I said, there's AADI, VidyaSagar in Chennai, there is Ability in Bangalore, there is in Calcutta, there are different you could say NGOs that have really, and many of them, there is something called Muskan.

00:55:19.650 --> 00:55:46.130
But I want to say that many of them they're successful because there're parents who had kids who were either intellectually impaired, mobility impaired, spinal injuries or whatever because they wanted to create situations for them.

00:55:46.480 --> 00:55:55.750
So that's how those NGOs and all were made so that they could actually educate them in that particular sense.

00:55:56.309 --> 00:56:09.040
So that's how I think in one particular sense education still is very, very difficult.

00:56:10.670 --> 00:56:16.379
Why do I write about for example, education in the globalizing era?

00:56:18.000 --> 00:56:28.330
Sometimes I feel that there are problems on the new liberal ideologies but there is some gains also.

00:56:29.750 --> 00:56:44.960
The gains might be in sense of getting a motorized wheelchair, and then these being made in Delhi where they are now becoming foldable, they can be put into the cars, which they can.

00:56:45.530 --> 00:56:58.040
Or the fact that corrupt JAWS, but at least the JAWS is there with people, youngsters who are doing their BAs and MAs or whatever is that.

00:56:58.559 --> 00:57:09.859
But I think one particular constituency, which you of course, are aware of the fact that many deaf people say that there's either a capital D and there's a small d.

00:57:10.849 --> 00:57:22.820
capital D where you say that you are ethnic minority with a different language pattern, which means that the sign language is there and you actually consider yourself as not disabled.

00:57:23.850 --> 00:57:27.870
But the small d's where you feel that the oralism must be there.

00:57:28.320 --> 00:57:33.689
I remember a movie called, I'm not sure whether you've seen that or not, it's called Children of a Lesser God.

00:57:34.199 --> 00:57:45.559
It's a beautiful movie, which indicates how this teacher is trying to teach them how oralism is important.

00:57:45.849 --> 00:57:58.560
And then this girl who becomes his friend and she doesn't want to really speak anything, she only wants to use the sign, in that particular sense.

00:57:58.770 --> 00:58:06.119
So it's a beautiful, romantic movie also and yet very, very powerful.

00:58:06.790 --> 00:58:16.530
Because it actually says that how he realizes, he will say things to her that Aachaa will not let me listen to Bach.

00:58:17.770 --> 00:58:29.349
And how the sound is coming to her and how the sound is coming to you, is there equality out there or not?

00:58:29.889 --> 00:58:36.680
That's the kind which I think can be found anywhere, everywhere, in that sense.

00:58:37.590 --> 00:58:44.020
So what I did in America, I should tell you this thing.

00:58:44.360 --> 00:58:51.180
You also asked me about who were my role models in that sense?

00:58:51.500 --> 00:58:59.650
So I think my role models were largely, I think bell hooks, Friere, Gramsci.

00:58:59.790 --> 00:59:07.940
Gramsci was also disabled, I kind of remember that.

00:59:08.480 --> 00:59:31.180
And many like Professor Sadgopal, Tanmoy Bhattacharya, many people who really have thought about for example, Tanmoy is very much, he's a linguistic but he also took up disability and how sign language is so important.

00:59:32.160 --> 00:59:40.860
And of course, how to understand the critical disability studies and this thing, and has a reading group and all.

00:59:41.920 --> 00:59:53.570
And many other, I think role models of course, are from the west, but many of them were also disabled.

00:59:54.599 --> 01:00:21.060
So one knew that how, for example, Janet Price, who was again, a wheelchair user and a feminist, and how to understand that the fact that people said that lot of, because we always questioned the medicalization, that that model is problematic.

01:00:21.320 --> 01:00:24.790
And yet I feel that you can't give up on that.

01:00:25.100 --> 01:00:36.819
So there was the social model and some way social model said that it's the society which is disabling us and it's the built environment and all.

01:00:37.159 --> 01:00:40.580
And also they, they, they are responsible for us.

01:00:40.600 --> 01:00:47.380
But when we say that, then we are thinking that where does the body go?

01:00:48.560 --> 01:00:51.130
Where does the pain of the body goes?

01:00:51.620 --> 01:01:03.120
Can we actually that well, yes, and I'm going to pick up sexuality for a few five minutes maybe.

01:01:04.440 --> 01:01:11.810
Because we always think of it as almost either it is sexuality or it's hypersexuality.

01:01:12.039 --> 01:01:25.439
So intellectually impaired and the mentally ill, mental illness was where we say that they are hypersexual or they're asexual, and asexual means that we don't have any desire.

01:01:26.159 --> 01:01:37.850
Now, in that particular sense, I think sexuality became one of the very, very important point for me to kind of take it up.

01:01:37.850 --> 01:01:48.960
And how to understand that whether one can look at desire or not or whether desire is in that particular sense, and there's pain also.

01:01:49.310 --> 01:01:56.070
So how to understand that, and is this social model in itself enough?

01:01:56.700 --> 01:01:58.890
And I feel that it also has to be.

01:01:59.320 --> 01:02:06.539
And then you can think about McRuer, and you can think about the compulsory able-bodiedness, which is there.

01:02:06.820 --> 01:02:09.810
And then of course the LGBT issues that come up.

01:02:10.210 --> 01:02:22.038
But very interesting part, which is there in India, for me, when I'm talk to my fellow disabled friends, sometimes they say that, "Anita, why do you have to talk about the lesbian and all that here only?"

01:02:22.038 --> 01:02:22.560
So I said, "Why?"

01:02:28.630 --> 01:02:37.129
He said, "Because one stigma as it is is there with us because we are disabled, another stigma will come when we are also lesbian."

01:02:37.130 --> 01:02:43.959
So they would say that why do you want to talk about two markers together?

01:02:45.520 --> 01:02:58.904
Now again, and I always used to say that but what is the, I have to kind of understand because many of them might be their sexual orientation is different and you've got to respect that part.

01:02:59.480 --> 01:03:09.049
But I think the word “queer” in that particular sense actually brought me to understand disability.

01:03:11.389 --> 01:03:23.474
In a bit clarify if I've done something solid that is to say that somewhere don't forget that there is somewhere an epistemology of disability.

01:03:23.474 --> 01:03:37.380
And it's not that when you do something just as a conceptual category, but you have to understand that what is the knowledge system?

01:03:37.880 --> 01:03:41.240
How do we understand the knowledge?

01:03:41.540 --> 01:03:50.720
And how we understand that ontology, knowledge, experience, all are important aspects.

01:03:51.049 --> 01:04:05.120
And I feel that if you understand them, you will understand that there is a lot that disabled people also have to give to the so-called able society, able bodied society.

01:04:06.059 --> 01:04:20.890
I can think about another role model, which is Tom Shakespeare, who actually wrote that book with Gillespie and Tom Shakespeare, which is on sexuality.

01:04:21.270 --> 01:04:43.670
And Tom Shakespeare used to always say this, that the “normal,” able-bodied people actually don't want to come to you because you are such a clear reminder that this also can happen to you.

01:04:46.469 --> 01:05:07.209
If you think about the [inaudible] , and if you think about cataract, if you think about arthritis, if you think about Alzheimer, if you think about dementia, if you think about hearing aids that you keep on, you can see that all of them somewhere are actually a combination of what disability is there in that sense.

01:05:07.209 --> 01:05:41.890
And I think that is where I feel that if we want to be, and for higher education, I feel that academia in itself, and this is very important for me to say that, that academia in itself I think, it's almost like when you say that are you blind?

01:05:44.180 --> 01:05:45.100
Have you gone deaf?

01:05:46.620 --> 01:05:48.000
This is their language.

01:05:48.290 --> 01:05:50.410
This is the Academy's language.

01:05:52.700 --> 01:05:54.520
Don't be stupid, don't be mad.

01:05:55.090 --> 01:06:01.820
The words in itself, are very important.

01:06:02.210 --> 01:06:07.200
And whenever you're talking to them about disability and they say, "Yeah, yeah.

01:06:07.230 --> 01:06:07.750
You're right.

01:06:07.750 --> 01:06:08.250
You're right."

01:06:08.570 --> 01:06:11.170
And after that, they'll start discussing something else.

01:06:11.840 --> 01:06:23.130
Which means that how an epistemology of disability is important for academia is not there at all.

01:06:23.500 --> 01:06:34.750
And with that, I started the first undergraduate course, with AD, where I actually picked up the Bollywood films and the Hollywood films.

01:06:36.260 --> 01:06:53.830
And I actually started creating some sort of an awareness and sensitization in, and I had something almost 68 students because films of course, students are always fascinated with the films also.

01:06:53.830 --> 01:07:01.500
And I think with that, I also learned a lot, I can tell you.

01:07:02.210 --> 01:07:12.649
Because then when I looked at the Bollywood, there's not a single movie in which disability is not there.

01:07:16.040 --> 01:07:24.249
They might have a negative representation, but the fact that it is there, and now of course, some of them are very, very...

01:07:24.669 --> 01:07:38.200
For example, Margarita with a Straw and also Barfi came up, and many, many, many movies which are actually little bit positive also in that sense did come up.

01:07:38.770 --> 01:08:02.909
And they really brought up this whole, and I used to take up for example, a very old movie of 1964 called Dosti, which had one blind boy and one who gets in an accident and cannot walk.

01:08:03.359 --> 01:08:10.883
So what he would do is that this blind guy started singing and people would give money to him.

01:08:10.883 --> 01:08:16.500
So he said that, "No, we are not going to do this.

01:08:16.500 --> 01:08:17.240
This is begging."

01:08:17.500 --> 01:08:18.710
So he said, "No, no.

01:08:18.969 --> 01:08:20.019
It's a skill.

01:08:20.450 --> 01:08:23.569
I'm singing, it's a skill that I'm using."

01:08:23.600 --> 01:08:25.640
And he used to use that mouth organ.

01:08:25.640 --> 01:08:31.410
So he said that, "But this is a skill, you know it, and that's how we are getting that.

01:08:31.460 --> 01:08:32.410
So big deal."

01:08:32.429 --> 01:08:53.049
And in the dialogue in 1964, the other guy wants to be educated so this guy says that, "Well, there are countries where they give you free education for everyone, so why is it that we don't have free education for all?"

01:08:53.049 --> 01:08:56.670
And it's really a marvelous movie.

01:08:56.670 --> 01:09:27.919
And as a comparison, I showed them My Left Foot which was somewhere, Christy Brown, which is his autobiography and how he becomes author and how right from the minute go, again, about seven to eight children and the mother who's there and the care part.

01:09:28.829 --> 01:09:33.729
How the care part is there and how he wants him to be educated.

01:09:34.449 --> 01:09:38.450
But he's a good painter also and he starts writing.

01:09:38.470 --> 01:09:42.793
And the very fact that he learns to write A, B, whatever, it becomes,

01:09:42.793 --> 01:09:43.590
I'm sorry there is-I mean, whatever.

01:09:43.810 --> 01:09:44.400
It becomes...

01:09:44.439 --> 01:09:45.149
I'm sorry.

01:09:45.270 --> 01:09:53.380
There's phone somewhere, but I can't find where it is.

01:09:53.399 --> 01:09:58.780
And it was with that, that I kind of started including these...

01:09:59.750 --> 01:10:01.410
I started with that particular this thing.

01:10:01.590 --> 01:10:17.700
Then of course, now I have other courses that are there on situating disability, where I'm trying to look at humanism and where I'm trying to look at what is posthumanism and people like Rosi Braidotti and all.

01:10:19.980 --> 01:10:25.480
They're trying to say that, look, humanism in itself has some problems.

01:10:25.590 --> 01:10:33.544
And how in the posthumanism you go into the technology, you go into the guide dogs and how you kind of also look at death in that particular sense.

01:10:33.544 --> 01:10:33.611
And I said that is something where...

01:10:33.611 --> 01:10:48.280
and then I go onto the third course, which is the gendering disability.

01:10:48.300 --> 01:10:53.120
And now I've reached a point where I've introduced PhD disability studies.

01:10:54.250 --> 01:11:05.599
Just five seats right now, but the fact that we managed to do this in these almost six years or so I mean like, we've done that.

01:11:06.849 --> 01:11:23.540
But I think, think something which is now important is that they understand disability not as I think as a token or as a concession category, but more as a knowledge in which you can enhance your own.

01:11:24.200 --> 01:11:34.400
And I think many of them when they come to my class, it's almost like they say that some of the things that we never even thought of our own selves.

01:11:35.000 --> 01:11:49.900
And it's so very, sometimes, very poignant where you come to know about their own subjectivities that is being kind of understood by understanding the disabling parts.

01:11:50.680 --> 01:11:54.160
And one of the very clear reading is on care.

01:11:54.570 --> 01:12:06.260
That how care in every understanding, way, where we also understand the unpaid work, where we also understand that mothers are largely...

01:12:06.300 --> 01:12:08.610
Women are the caregivers.

01:12:09.340 --> 01:12:11.820
But we also understand the care recipients.

01:12:12.780 --> 01:12:19.559
How, when care is given, care is sometimes given like that, that they never ask.

01:12:19.860 --> 01:12:21.470
That this is what you wanted.

01:12:22.700 --> 01:12:33.110
And I try and make them understand that there's actually interdependence because there is no one who's completely independent.

01:12:33.110 --> 01:12:44.090
I mean, after all, you and I are having a chat because there is technology, because it is saying that we can have some...

01:12:44.290 --> 01:12:55.510
And in a way I feel there is a part of me which says that, "My God, now we can never travel," because everybody would say that there's a online chat everywhere.

01:12:56.570 --> 01:13:14.540
There is that part also, but the fact that now we can actually have these real interactions with other professors, like Professor Goodley came or [Gregor Walbring] . Also another model for me.

01:13:14.740 --> 01:13:16.809
You know he had...

01:13:16.810 --> 01:13:20.420
His mother had thalidomide in sixties, right?

01:13:20.880 --> 01:13:30.639
And when all the mothers who had thalidomide, all the children, they were born without the limbs.

01:13:31.860 --> 01:13:33.380
Some without the arms.

01:13:33.660 --> 01:13:35.950
He lost his legs completely.

01:13:37.170 --> 01:13:42.110
So, he and I remember where we were in Winnipeg and we were coming back to...

01:13:42.190 --> 01:13:45.169
I mean, he had to go to Calgary and I had to come to Toronto.

01:13:45.570 --> 01:13:46.509
So there was a flight.

01:13:46.740 --> 01:13:49.570
So, the same flight was there which we had to change.

01:13:49.870 --> 01:13:50.700
So he was like...

01:13:51.270 --> 01:13:59.000
He just kind of crawled and came up to the seat and I was waiting for my wheelchair to come and you know that.

01:13:59.450 --> 01:14:10.210
So he kind of jokes with me and says that, see Anita, you are also mainstreamed, because you never think about crawling.

01:14:11.390 --> 01:14:14.270
Crawling is also kind of mobility, right?

01:14:15.660 --> 01:14:18.999
And, why can't you kind...

01:14:18.999 --> 01:14:21.570
I mean, children always crawl, no?

01:14:21.950 --> 01:14:22.980
And I also laugh.

01:14:22.980 --> 01:14:24.129
I always say that, "Yeah, yeah.

01:14:24.169 --> 01:14:30.280
I'm really not as, I mean, maybe you are really a rebellion I'm...

01:14:30.990 --> 01:14:32.470
It'll take me some time."

01:14:34.280 --> 01:14:35.659
Vishesh: Yeah.Assimilated so far.

01:14:36.160 --> 01:14:37.630
Anita: Yeah, exactly.

01:14:38.440 --> 01:14:41.589
And I think so that is where I feel...

01:14:41.590 --> 01:14:42.720
Or Dan Goodley.

01:14:43.120 --> 01:14:56.943
I mean, another role model I think is where he tries to, I mean, we were doing something together and I said that, "My God, Dan, you've got 500 citations and I've got like 1100 citations.

01:14:56.943 --> 01:15:02.990
And yet I'm one of the very well known or whatever."

01:15:03.190 --> 01:15:04.549
So Dan said.

01:15:04.870 --> 01:15:11.020
So what happens to why UK cites UK only and America sites, America only.

01:15:11.420 --> 01:15:18.360
And they will not think about you, because they will never cite you, because you are somewhere in developing country and whatever.

01:15:19.070 --> 01:15:21.440
So he says, "Why do you worry about such things?"

01:15:21.440 --> 01:15:22.800
I said, "No, no, I'm not worried.

01:15:23.019 --> 01:15:25.400
I'm just trying to tell you that you are so many.

01:15:25.520 --> 01:15:26.989
And I have like these many."

01:15:27.920 --> 01:15:30.989
And also because disability studies came very late in my life.

01:15:30.990 --> 01:15:35.809
I mean, when I was teaching psychology primarily, in that sense.

01:15:36.309 --> 01:15:46.620
So I think maybe I should stop here and let you ask if there's anything that I might have missed out.

01:15:47.260 --> 01:15:49.110
Vishesh: There were so many interesting things.

01:15:49.110 --> 01:15:50.990
I don't know if I have any...

01:15:51.530 --> 01:15:58.320
I don't think you've missed any point, but some things I wanted to quick.

01:15:58.540 --> 01:15:59.790
Some things I-

01:15:59.820 --> 01:16:01.030
Anita: COVID, COVID, COVID.

01:16:01.080 --> 01:16:01.360
Vishesh: Sure.

01:16:01.630 --> 01:16:01.850
Anita: Right.

01:16:02.600 --> 01:16:02.913
Vishesh: That's the last question.

01:16:03.040 --> 01:16:09.180
Anita: Yeah, no, actually, maybe there's a reading that I could share with you, which I did for EPW.

01:16:09.920 --> 01:16:18.090
And how the very idea that when COVID happened...

01:16:18.090 --> 01:16:25.550
I mean I would listen to God knows how many lectures on the channels and all that.

01:16:27.100 --> 01:16:34.570
Disabled people were not there in their mind at all.

01:16:36.180 --> 01:16:39.219
I mean, they don't even think about the hospitals.

01:16:39.549 --> 01:16:47.030
They don't think about the hearing impaired and how they will have a mask if they can't use the sign language.

01:16:47.369 --> 01:16:51.220
And if they are actually had to say something.

01:16:51.680 --> 01:16:53.640
And the touch.

01:16:54.670 --> 01:16:57.760
They keep on saying social distancing, social distancing.

01:16:57.980 --> 01:17:00.600
What is going to happen to the disabled people?

01:17:01.120 --> 01:17:07.590
And I wanted to tell you that when I had COVID, I mean, I would get the food, right?

01:17:07.620 --> 01:17:08.530
That's not a issue.

01:17:08.560 --> 01:17:09.740
They would leave the food.

01:17:10.250 --> 01:17:20.830
But to put the sheet on my bed was such a problematic part because how to do it from one part to the other part?

01:17:21.620 --> 01:17:39.339
Initially they started giving me the disposables so that I don't have to wash, but there were two or three bags and there was no way that the garbage would be taken out because stigma is, there's so much out here and that people don't really come close to you.

01:17:40.309 --> 01:17:44.400
So in that sense, so then I said, "No, no, please give me whatever the steel utensils.

01:17:44.750 --> 01:17:46.019
At least I can wash them."

01:17:46.850 --> 01:17:51.669
And I think the washing part brought a lot of catharsis in me.

01:17:51.670 --> 01:17:57.060
I mean, I thought that this is something which I would want to kind of really do that.

01:17:57.580 --> 01:18:00.009
And yet I think...

01:18:01.309 --> 01:18:08.040
I mean, one advantage, again was technology.

01:18:08.760 --> 01:18:10.219
You could actually get the...

01:18:10.849 --> 01:18:13.330
But the problems which were there.

01:18:13.330 --> 01:18:15.549
I remember when it...

01:18:15.660 --> 01:18:26.860
This was one case which came up from America where they said that if you need a ventilator, don't give the ventilator to disabled person.

01:18:26.860 --> 01:18:28.469
And I was taken aback.

01:18:28.500 --> 01:18:29.330
I said, "Meaning?"

01:18:29.340 --> 01:18:40.030
And this will take me closer to what are some of the issues that are very important for me is the euthanasia.

01:18:41.030 --> 01:18:43.070
And the eugenics.

01:18:43.700 --> 01:18:51.560
I mean we in India, we've kind of said that passive euthanasia has been passed in that particular sense.

01:18:51.860 --> 01:18:58.050
And they also have something called living wills, where they say that you can decide that if you want to live or not.

01:18:58.090 --> 01:18:59.040
I mean, whatever.

01:18:59.440 --> 01:19:08.070
And I mean, they're talking about a country where kidneys sold and there's kidneys is a business kind of a thing in our country.

01:19:08.530 --> 01:19:10.630
And you're talking about living wills where they would...

01:19:10.679 --> 01:19:20.700
I mean people who are not really who are disabled, they would be kind of forced to kind of do that in one particular sense.

01:19:20.700 --> 01:19:24.309
I don't think consent would be there in that sense.

01:19:24.309 --> 01:19:35.770
I mean, I remember somebody, you might have heard about him or not, but somebody called Peter Singer, who is another kind of a role model, the anti-role model.

01:19:36.310 --> 01:19:46.670
I mean, who would say that, "Why do you need to kind of waste money on a down syndrome and also on these people?

01:19:46.950 --> 01:19:47.820
I mean, why?

01:19:48.070 --> 01:19:51.869
You can use the money somewhere fruitfully."

01:19:51.869 --> 01:19:58.730
And that is something which annoys me in every possible way.

01:19:58.730 --> 01:20:02.190
Vishesh: This was incredibly illuminating.

01:20:02.190 --> 01:20:06.740
There were so many things and mostly, I wanted to just hear more details.

01:20:07.350 --> 01:20:09.889
So if anything, have you written...

01:20:10.900 --> 01:20:12.270
Or what would be your key things...

01:20:12.510 --> 01:20:21.230
The two things that I really wanted to hear more about, three things, I think were when you went through the social versus medical model and you compared it with sexuality.

01:20:21.570 --> 01:20:22.925
That felt interesting, but I...

01:20:22.925 --> 01:20:25.690
Do you have a recommended reading on it?

01:20:25.690 --> 01:20:29.800
I don't think I got a full enough picture from your description just in this.

01:20:29.800 --> 01:20:37.989
Anita: No, I think maybe what I could do was to send a couple of readings to you.

01:20:37.990 --> 01:20:38.469
Vishesh: Yeah.

01:20:39.070 --> 01:20:40.170
Anita: There's a-

01:20:40.170 --> 01:20:40.200
Vishesh: Yes.

01:20:40.200 --> 01:20:40.339
Anita: There's a latest...

01:20:40.389 --> 01:20:43.270
This thing I wrote in Routledge book.

01:20:43.960 --> 01:20:47.170
There's one on sexuality and sex education, along with it.

01:20:47.460 --> 01:20:53.370
I mean, I could send you that, and then there could be also...

01:20:55.809 --> 01:21:04.379
Again, that disabled women agenda of excluded this thing that I think should be read.

01:21:04.530 --> 01:21:09.690
I mean, because if you are to understand the women's movement and education comes up into that, I mean.

01:21:10.770 --> 01:21:12.020
Vishesh: Yeah, absolutely.

01:21:12.140 --> 01:21:15.870
Anita: And in that sense, of course, I've written...

01:21:15.889 --> 01:21:18.019
Then there are two books that I've done.

01:21:18.070 --> 01:21:26.420
I've done Rethinking Disability in India and I've done Disability in South Asia: Knowledge and Experience.

01:21:26.670 --> 01:21:31.990
This is a edited book and this is also what I'm really...

01:21:32.270 --> 01:21:46.220
I feel proud is that youngsters in India, they've written many, many chapters so I'm very glad that they are kind of trying to come up to disability studies in that sense.

01:21:46.290 --> 01:21:53.980
So that also is there, which I could again, send you the references and you can share that with it.

01:21:54.490 --> 01:21:59.100
I mean, readings, there can be many I could kind of check with you.

01:22:00.410 --> 01:22:03.510
Maybe not as many as Dan Goodley, whatever I have.

01:22:03.670 --> 01:22:03.720
[laughter]

01:22:03.720 --> 01:22:03.750
END