India - Survey of Persons with Disabilities NSS 76th Round : July 2018 - December 2018

The National Sample Survey made its first attempt to collect information on the number of physically disabled persons during 15th round (July 1959 - June 1960). The survey on disabled persons (Schedule 26) was last conducted during 58th round of NSS (July – December 2002). Information was collected from the households on the nature of disability, viz. visual, hearing, speech and locomotor, of the household members. Along with these, mental disability was also considered in 58th round.

The main objective of the survey on “Survey of Persons with Disabilities” is to estimate indicators of incidence and prevalence of disability, cause of disability, age at onset of disability, facilities available to the persons with disability, difficulties faced by persons with disability in accessing public building/public transport, arrangement of regular care giver, out-of pocket expense relating to disability, etc. Further, estimates will be obtained on various employment and unemployment particulars in usual status for the household members with at least one disability. For each of the household members of age 12 to 59 years, information will be collected on whether receiving/received vocational/technical training. Also, for the household members with at least one disability who received formal vocational/technical training, information will be collected on field of training, duration of training, type of training, source of funding the training, etc.

Some of the important features of the Survey of Persons with Disabilities are given below:

(i) households members with disabilities will be identified using various features of each of the broad seven types of disabilities viz., locomotor, visual, hearing, speech and language, mental retardation/ intellectual disability, mental illness, other disabilities.

(ii) Provision has been made in Schedule 26 to classify the persons with disabilities as per the classification used in PWD Act 2016

(iii) For the persons with disabilities, data will be collected on difficulty faced in accessing/ using public transport and accessing/ using public building.

(iv)For the persons with disabilities, information will be collected whether having certificate of disability and percentage of disability as per certificate

(v) For the persons with disabilities, information will be collected on arrangement of regular care giver.

(vi)Information on out-of-pocket expenses relating to disability will be recorded

(vii) For the persons with disabilities in the age group 3 to 35 years, information will be collected on particulars of enrolment in education.

(viii) For each of the household members with disability, employment and unemployment particulars will be collected in usual status.

(ix) For each of the household members of age 12 to 59 years with disability, information will be collected on whether receiving/received vocational/ technicaltraining. Moreover, those who received formal vocational/ technical training, further information will be collected on field of training, duration of training, type of training, source of funding the training, etc.

Randomly selected households based on sampling procedure and members of the household.