Is IT India disabled-friendly?

Dr Asha Goyal, vice president of Quality at IBM Global Services India, has
been in the IT industry for more than 25 years, and is a lady of considerable
achievements. She began her career with TCS, was the general manager of Fujitsu
ICIM Pune, played a role in setting up the software export facility for HCL
Perot Systems as the executive vice-president of Software Development, and is
currently responsible for developing and maintaining world-class quality
standards in delivery technology. She was born with polio.

"None of my bosses has ever been conscious of the fact that he's
carried my brief cases," she says. It would be difficult to presume if
"not being conscious" showed sympathy or empathy. But, Dr Goyal's
case seems to be an exception, considering stories about professional
discrimination of the disabled, in the private sector, are still doing the
rounds. An audit done by a non-governmental body, some time back, found that the
average employment rate of disabled people in the private sector was only 0.28%.
The Persons with Disabilities Act, 1995 however, mandates appropriate
governments and local authorities, within the limits of their economic capacity
and development, to provide incentives to employers, both in public and private
sectors, to ensure that at least 5% of their work force is composed of persons
with disabilities.

Ramp entry for the handicapped at Tesco HSC

Talking specifically about the IT industry, it is an easy one for the
disabled to find work in as the nature of the work is such that there is not too
much physical movement or labor involved. The good news is, software houses
around the country are now beginning to articulate a need to be
disabled-friendly. The reasons may look selfish: the physically challenged, when
given an opportunity to work with a big name, will stay longer in the company
than his 'able' counterpart. But, many multinationals, with strict laws for
employing disabled people, have been hiring them, or are at least thinking of
hiring. IBM's employee count includes close to 1% of people with disabilities.
Tesco, in the UK, has 14% of its workforce coming from the challenged community.
Its Hindustan Service Centre, in Bangalore, is also keen on providing them an
equal opportunity. "We are in talks with people who work with the blind. We
will be quite happy to employ the disabled since our infrastructure is
disabled-friendly: it has easy access to all places and every floor has a toilet
facility. Once we have these people on board, sensitizing others will not be a
problem," says Meena Ganesh, CEO, Tesco HSC. Sensitizing will be an issue
in some places because if you are employing the hearing impaired, others have to
be educated on sign language.

Awareness about disability is a relatively recent phenomenon. Since the IT
industry in India is also young, many companies had the advantage of creating
disabled-friendly infrastructure, in terms of height and width of rooms, wheel
chair access, ramps and toilet facilities, right from the very beginning. Those
who did not do that, will probably need to re-look at their spaces and invest in
creating the support. Looking at what multinationals have done would help. IBM
ensures Real Estate Service Organization compliance with worldwide policy on
building accessibility. "We ensure Occupational Health & Safety
standards/HR compliance with worldwide policy on workplace accommodations. IBM
offices have special ramps/toilets for people with physical disabilities. For
the visually disabled, there are signages in Braille on public utilities like
conference room numbers, toilets signages etc," says Martin Appel,
vice-president of HR.

One Indian company that deserves a mention here is Lasersoft Infosystems, a
banking solution provider from Chennai-14 % of its employees are physically
challenged. Polio-affected R Selvakumar, who has been working here for the last
four years, says: "Over a period of time my work had been recognized, and
now I am the in charge of an institute called LITE. In LITE, we provide training
in software exclusively to the disabled. It is a six-month course with stipend
and, after the final evaluation, trainees are recruited into Lasersoft."

BPO houses are also realizing the stability factor, which the physically
challenged may bring to a role. MphasiS has been working with VOICES, a public
charitable trust in Bangalore, to provide employment for the physically
handicapped in the burgeoning BPO sector. A company spokesperson said those
already employed are contributing handsomely in their respective functions,
which spread from administration and operations to areas such as testing. If the
results are good, who'd complain? Explains Jyotindra Mehta, a visually
challenged programmer with IBM: "I haven't been employed because of my
disability. If you show consistent results, you can knock down all barriers. The
bottom line here is profit, and no boss can discriminate if you are producing
results."

Goutam Das in
Bangalore