Where Coal is gold, children’s education can be dumped! This has been followed by the mining-savvy Orissa government in a small Matulu Camp village-as the name suggests, a resettled habitation, in Rengali block of Sambalpur district in Orissa. There was a ‘school’, up to class 5th in this village just three years ago. But, the school is now reminding a World War-II concentration camp, where about 100 children of ten classes are being forced inside a dingy 20/15 ft room community centre building.

Recently during Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh’s maiden visit to Orissa, once again it was re-established that the most powerful word that drives the politicians and bureaucrats in contemporary Orissa is the infamous three-letter word KBK (Kalahandi–Bolangir–Koraput). It has been more then a decade that KBK area has been showered with specially designed programmes, grants and so many high profile visits. Unfortunately, the benefits of all these assistances are yet to reach the people of the region.

‘Education for all’ still remains a distant dream and for disabled, it is even more remote in India. A recent survey of the National Center for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (NCPEDP), revealed that only 1.2 per cent of the disabled in India has had any form of education. In its effort to have an all India school level survey, NCPEDP found that from the 89 schools, 34 did not have a single disabled student and unfortunately, 18 of them having a policy against giving admission.