In the last few years, significant changes have been made to improve the life of deaf people around the world. The United Nations is supporting more and more the human rights of deaf people and works closely with the World Federation of the Deaf (WFD). In 1993 the UN General Assembly adopted the Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities. It states the status of sign language and services provided in sign language:

According to the WFD, Rule 6 in this mentioned Standard Rules is to be understood as following:

"... sign language should be the language of instruction for Deaf children... and schools for the Deaf children should employ Deaf teachers...."

Another important step has been undertaken to improve the life of Deaf people by the World Conference on Special Needs Education: Access and Quality, held in Salamanca, Spain, in 1994 that was organized by UNESCO. The output of that conference was the so called "Salamanca Statement and Framework for Action on Special Needs Education", and it is now an official document of UNESCO. According to the WFD, the following item 21 is very important to know:

"Educational policies should take full account of individual differences and situations. The importance of sign language as the medium of communication among the deaf, for example, should be recognized and provision made to ensure that all deaf persons have access to education in their national sign language".

By looking at these statements - as well in the Standard Rules and in the Salamanca Statement - someone may think that these are powerful and wonderful words to be easily adopted by each country on this earth in order to improve the more than 70 million lives of the Deaf people. You may think you just to surrender these rules to each responsible government and everything will be fine for the Deaf Community.

Unfortunately, the reality is very different as it is a common knowledge. How far do these statements apply to the deaf people, especially in India? Regarding to the school education being a deaf teacher myself, many questions had come to my mind before coming to India:

Is India able to provide good deaf schools as stated in the UN Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities? Are the levels of the deaf schools equally to the hearing schools? Do the deaf schools use the same curriculum like hearing schools? Is the Indian Sign Language allowed to be used at deaf schools? Is it a language of instruction to be used in classrooms? Are the deaf children taught in sign language as a language from the pre-school age on? Are they aware of their sign language having an own grammar? Or are deaf children taught in spoken language only or like both (Total Communication) without having the awareness of having an own language ? Are deaf children aware of having Deaf Culture and are taught in that, too ? Are hearing teachers treating the deaf children respectfully and equally? Are hearing teachers fluently in sign language or do they reject and oppress it? Are there deaf schools who educate deaf children bilingually? What is the philosophy of each deaf school - especially of the principal? Do the teachers and principals share the same philosophy in teaching deaf children?

Do the hearing teachers encourage the deaf children to go for higher education like hearing children (e.g. go to university)? What kind of teaching method is used in classrooms? Do deaf schools hire deaf teachers? Do the deaf teachers have the same education like hearing teachers? Do they get the same salary? Are they equally respected teachers among the hearing teachers? Do the deaf children respect the deaf teachers and use them as their role models? Do the deaf teachers sign and support sign language? Are the deaf teachers strong role models? How does the collaboration function between the hearing parents and the deaf schools and between the Deaf Association and the Deaf schools?

What kind of power do the parents have at schools ? What kind of influence do they have on the education in classroom especially by hearing teachers ? How do the hearing teachers support the hearing parents ? What kind of information is provided to them ?

Regarding the deaf community in India generally I had questions like these: How do the deaf people in general live in India? How is the relationship between them and the hearing society in general? How much does the hearing society know about the needs of the deaf people? And vice versa -how much does the deaf community educate the hearing people about the needs of deaf people? Is Sign Language recognized as an equal language to the spoken language by law? How many different sign languages do exist in India? How strong is the deaf community? Does it have many strong deaf leaders? How strong are the Deaf Associations around the states and cities ? Are they lead by deaf people? How about the National Deaf Association in New Delhi? What kind of services /programes do the Deaf Association provide for the Deaf Community ? What do they do in order to improve the life of deaf people in all ages? Are deaf people aware of having a Deaf Culture? Can deaf people marry each other? Can Deaf people drive a car by themselves ? Do Deaf people have professional sign language interpreters to be able to participate at events in the hearing community? Is such a training provided to educate professional sign language interpreters?

Many, many more questions had been buzzing in my mind before leaving for India that can´t all be listed here. The questions as listed should not give the impression that I wanted to "research" the situation of deaf people in India and then give a "judge" over it. The questions should only give thoughts of the situation of deaf people in India in generally - not only for myself but hopefully also for every Indian reader especially those who work in the Deaf field. Anyway, being a deaf teacher I directed special attention on the statements as quoted from the Standard Rules and Salamanca Statement as above during my visit at deaf schools.

The following report is divided in two parts - the first part focuses on the observations and experiences during the visits at deaf schools - the second part on the workshops given by me at the Deaf Associations and meeting deaf adults there. In the report I am trying to give answers to the questions above as far as possible based on my observations and talks to the deaf people. It is a fact that deaf people all over in the world face more or less the same problems oppression by hearing people. Problems faced by deaf people in India will be addressed here but at the same time solutions will be suggested.