Civil Society Summit

Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled participated in the Civil Society Summit held in Bangalore, from 24th to 26th January. Hon. Minister for Law, Government of India, Veerappa Moily inaugurated the Summit. The Summit is special since on Jan 26th, India completes 60 years as a Sovereign republic. The Civil Society Summit discussed the state of our 60 Republic years. It was structured in such a way, so that everyone gets to interact and gain understanding on their areas of interest. Its primary goal was to bring together leading thinkers and practitioners in development and human rights with their counterparts in different sectors.
The Aim of the Summit was to   inform the civil society actors about the developments in knowledge, cutting edge technology and tools, inspire by having living legends interact with upcoming leaders, innovate by providing space and opportunity for diverse actors to interact and find areas of synergy and coordinate in action by providing opportunity for sharing information on their activities.
Speaking, at the occasion about Challenges in Accessibility and UNCRPD, Mr. Mahantesh G.K. of Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled said that the vital principle of any progressive society is accessibility and opined that persons with disability are routinely denied of the basic rights of receiving education, moving around freely, living independently, getting employed even when well qualified, accessing information, obtaining health care, exercising political rights etc. The Vital tool in enabling accessibility is the UNCRPD to which India is also a signatory and the purpose of UNCRPD is to promote, protect and ensure equal enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms by all the persons with disabilities and to promote respect for their inherent dignity he opined.
The Summit honored present day Freedom fighters and remembered who are no longer with us. The Freedom fighter Awards were given to those who made significant contribution in defending the freedoms enshrined in our constitution.

Some of the important issues discussed in the Summit were the Challenges to commons, Constitutional vacuum, threats to farmers and food security, urban and rural governance, peace building, electoral reforms, migration and labour, health, education, international relations and responsibilities, fair-trade, women and Panchayat Raj, Children and governance and CERI Manifesto