About 82 persons in Doda village unable to speak, listen
Sanjeev K Sharma
JAMMU, Sept 15: It’s not the clock alarm but the sweet chirp of birds which awake the people living in the beautiful hamlet ‘Dadkahie’ that rests amidst tall trees in the mountainous Doda district of J&K, but, the 60 years old Alam is not that lucky to listen all such melodious voices of colourful winged creatures and the world too has never listen any word from him.
Surprisingly, from the 4-year-old Ibrahim (name changed) to Alam, there are about 82 people in Dadkahie who are unable to listen or speak and the strange disability has hit them right from their births.
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This is not the whole story. The surprise and shock is still more as even after 77 years of independence and after witnessing several elections, Dadkahie still awaits a school for the deaf and the dumb-a very-very important institution for a significant number of people living in the village.
“In the year 1990, we raised the demand of a school for the deaf and the dumb people in the village as population of such persons that time in Dadkahie was only 46 but till date none has bothered to look into the crucial demand while many Governments have changed in these years and population of such unfortunate persons in the village has now increased to 82,” rued Hanief Chowdhary, 70, an elder of the village who earlier helmed a rural local body in the area.
He said that all the 82 deaf and dumb persons in the village never took admission in a school as there was no such facility for the special education which they need and therefore the same remained one of the prime reasons for their being illiterate and unemployed.
“My own family has two sons-Shabir Ahmed and Aftab Ahmed and two daughters-Rakia and Fatima who are unable to speak and hear,” Hanief continued adding that all his children and a nephew remained uneducated and have now become over-aged for jobs.
Similarly, one Ibrahim from Dadkahie has six children, all were deaf and dumb.
Some villagers informed that Army had helped the deaf and dumb people of the village with certain short term programmes of sign language.
To the Dadkahie village, about 65 km from district headquarters Doda, the residents have to trek 5-7 km on hilly path after de-boarding from the vehicle as the hamlet lacks road connectivity.
Another elder from the village asserted that as elections to the J&K Legislative Assembly (LA) are starting from September 18, 2024, they expect that the upcoming Government should give a school for deaf and dumb persons in the village so that a significant number of people living there may be benefitted.
He informed that previous such assurances and promises during elections were never honoured by any of the political party even after coming to power.
Hanief said that total population of the village was 3500 and out of 82 deaf and dumb persons, 50 are eligible voters possessing Voter Cards also and they all cast their votes during every election while there are four Polling Stations in the village.
Another local of Dadkahie said that many media bigwigs, renowned social workers and popular doctors visited the hamlet but nothing outcome emerged to benefit the 82 specially abled persons there.
An elder of the village informed that there were about 102 deaf and dumb people in Dadkahie but some of them have died by now and presently 82 such persons are living in the village.
“The first case of deaf and dumb was detected in the year 1901 in Dadkahie and after that the disability hit seven families,” he further said.
Resentment against the concerned authorities is very clear in the village and more locals claimed that there was no primary school within 10 km.
“The only reason for grave neglect of this place is that the village is inhabited entirely by the poor Gujjar community members,” more residents of Dadkahie claimed adding that the only High School in the village was upgraded in the year 2003 but so far no proper staff has been provided there while the Primary Health Centre in the village was upgraded in 2014 but no doctor has been appointed there so far.
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