Award for Tamil Nadu for empowerment of persons with disabilities
The Hindu
The State has taken steps to rehabilitate abandoned mentally ill persons, says Centre
Tamil Nadu was on Friday awarded the best State for promoting empowerment of persons with disabilities (PwD) in the Centre’s annual national-level awards for the disability sector.
Along with the State, several individuals, NGOs and government departments were handed over the 2020 awards by President Ram Nath Kovind at a ceremony here on International Day of PwD.
In the award citation issued by the Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry, Tamil Nadu was honoured for “focusing its attention in taking up and implementing programmes/schemes for the rehabilitation and empowerment of persons with disabilities”. The State had given the highest Budget allocation for the department concerned with PwD, issued 13.35 lakh disability certificates and granted recognition to 382 special schools run by NGOs, the citation said.
As speculation over the continuation of Minister for Scheduled Tribes Welfare B. Nagendra in the Cabinet persisted, with the demand for his resignation raised by the BJP in connection with the ₹94 crore scam at the Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation, his Cabinet colleagues came to his defence on Thursday.