India’s language policy for deaf and hard-of-hearing people

Abstract The aim of the paper is to investigate India’s language policy for its deaf and hard-of-hearing community. Although India’s language policy has been examined in great detail in existing research, policies for deaf and hard-of-hearing have received little attention by scholars. In light of the scarcity of debate and research on policies for deaf and hard-of-hearing people, the paper focuses on four key issues. First, it takes a critical view of the neglect of deaf and hard-of-hearing at various levels, including academic, social and political. Second, it discusses the negative consequences of the problematic terminology that has been used in Indian censuses to count the number of deaf people in India. Third, the paper examines policy legislation in two domains (media and education) along with certain recent initiatives and their implementation, with the purpose of analysing to what extent recent policy changes have addressed, in these two domains, the needs of deaf and hard-of-hearing people. Finally, the paper discusses the drawbacks of the oralist teaching method practised in Indian schools. The discussion of these issues is followed by certain policy recommendations, one of which is to recognise the Indian Sign Language as one of the official languages of India so that a more inclusive policy for deaf and hard-of-hearing can be devised.