'Disability No Bar To Excellence In Legal Profession' : Supreme Court Mentions Examples Of Legal Luminaries With Disabilities
In a judgment of great significance for the rights of persons with disabilities, the Supreme Court today quashed a rule of the Madhya Pradesh judicial services which disallowed visually impaired and low-vision candidates from seeking appointment to judicial services."Visually impaired candidates cannot be said to be 'not suitable' for judicial service and they are eligible to participate...
In a judgment of great significance for the rights of persons with disabilities, the Supreme Court today quashed a rule of the Madhya Pradesh judicial services which disallowed visually impaired and low-vision candidates from seeking appointment to judicial services.
"Visually impaired candidates cannot be said to be 'not suitable' for judicial service and they are eligible to participate in selection for posts in judicial service," the Court held.
While emphasising the fundamental right to reasonable accommodation through affirmative action and recognising substantive equality by acknowledging that any form of indirect discrimination would also lead to exclusion, a bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and R. Mahadevan mentioned some of the exemplary achievements of persons with disabilities in the legal profession.
In the IDAP interview series, 'It Can Be Done' conducted by Rahul Bajaj, Anusha Reddy, and Madhavi Singh, interviews of ten lawyers and judges with blindness/low vision, out of which two are from India, were conducted.
Senior Advocate S.K. Rungta, who was conferred with the senior advocate designation in 2011 by the Delhi High Court, has dedicated his career to breaking down barriers for the differently-abled. Initially relying on clerks for mobility and legal filing, he substantially reduced the dependence with the advent of assistive technology.
His contributions have been instrumental from facilitating the entry of blind persons into the civil services to enforcing disability reservations under Indian law. He has also secured the right of blind persons to serve as witnesses and shaped the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995.
Next is Nirmata Narasimhan, who is a visually impaired lawyer and Policy Director at the Centre for Internet and Society. She has played a key role in drafting India's National Policy on Universal Electronic Accessibility. She has worked extensively with government agencies to integrate accessibility into public programs.
She was awarded the National Award for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities in 2010.
Other remarkable persons who were interviewed include Justice Zak Mohammed Yacoob, former judge of the South African Constitutional Court who lost his sight at 19 months due to meningitis; Justice David S. Tatel, a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit; David Lepofsky, a distinguished Canadian lawyer; Tomer Rosner, a blind legal advisor to the Israeli Parliament who played a key role in drafting legislations concerning disability rights; Mr. Jack Chen, a blind patent attorney at Google; Yetnebersh Nigussie, an Ethiopian lawyer and disability rights activist who lists her eyesight at the age of five; Judge Ronald M. Gould of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and Haben Girma, the first deafblind graduate of Harvard Law School.
Other Indian names include Milan Mittal, a visually impaired lawyer at Indus Law firm; Rajesh Asudani, who began his career as a railway announcer and later pursued law and rose to become an Assistant Manager of RBI and Shirish Deshpande, a facility member at MNLU, who pursued his studies from University of Oxford.
The Court stated that these are examples of persons who have demonstrated that visual impairment is no barrier to attaining professional excellence, competing on equal footing, and making significant contributions to the justice delivery system alongside their able-bodied counterparts.
The Court said that they all stand as a testament to the fact that "disability is no bar to excellence in the legal profession or any other field."
Case Details: IN RE RECRUITMENT OF VISUALLY IMPAIRED IN JUDICIAL SERVICES v. THE REGISTRAR GENERAL THE HIGH COURT OF MADHYA PRADESH.,SMW(C) No. 2/2024
Appearances: Senior Advocate Gaurav Agrawal, Amicus
Petitioners: Nishit Agrawal, AOR; Mr. Sarthak Rastogi, Adv.; Ms. Kanishka Mittal, Adv.; Mr. Shrey Kapoor, Adv.; Ms. Upasna Agrawal, Adv; Mr. Siddhartha Iyer, AOR; Mr. Chhatresh Kumar Sahu, Adv.; Mr. Jabar Singh, Adv.; Mr. Shubham, Adv.; Ms. Aparna Mehrotra, Adv.; Mr. Apoorva Srivastava, Adv.; Mr. Satyam Srivastava, Adv.; For M/s.V. Maheshwari & Co., AOR and Mr. Ravi Raghunath, AOR
Advocate Arjun Garg for State of Madhya Pradesh; Archana Pathak Dave; Additional Solicitor General appearing for the Union of India