University of Melbourne Vice Chancellor Meets with Minister Gehlot, Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India
University of Melbourne Vice Chancellor Meets with Minister Gehlot, Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India.
The Nossal Institute have been working in disability in India for the past 10 years in partnership with the Public Health Foundation of India, CBM India, the Emmanuel Hospital Association and CHGN Uttarakhand Cluster. This research has utilised the Rapid Assessment of Disability tool and has focussed on researching Community Based Rehabilitation programs and Disabled People’s Organisations. Building on this extensive work, the Nossal, with the support of the Melbourne Disability Institute, was instrumental in the development of an India-Australia bilateral MoU on disability. This was signed in December 2018 when the President of India visited Melbourne.
Building on this, Professor Duncan Maskell (Vice Chancellor), along with Professor Shitij Kapur (DVCI and Dean of the faulty of MDHS), Craig Jeffrey (Director of the Australia India Institute), Prof Muthupandian Ashokkumar (Assistant DVCI), A/Prof Nathan Grills (Nossal Institute and Aii) and Tim Kendal (Counsellor-Economic at the Australian High Commission, New Delhi) met with the Honourable Minister Shri Thaawarchand Gehlot at his residence in Delhi.
The minister gave his full support to the collaborative programs between the University of Melbourne and the ministry for Social Justice and Empowerment. These programs include:
- Co-designing a novel course on Community Disability Inclusion which is currently being undertaken jointly by the University of Melbourne and Department of Empowerment of People with Disability.
- Undertaking modelling for an economic case for an NDIS in India. This involves research to model the impact of government investment in disability and will draw on Australian experience in modelling NDI
- Partnering in the new National Institute for Mental Health Rehabilitation and Research in India.
- Developing and researching a mental health resilience training program (Nae Disha): The Nossal and the Australia India Institute (Aii) have both been involved and the program is now being trialled in India at the National Disability Institute.
This body of work has been led and supported by the Nossal Institute in conjunction with the Melbourne Disability Institute - under the leadership of Bruce Bonyhady.
Associated with this meeting a number of key collaborative documents were signed.
The Minister has been invited to the high level Australia-India leadership dialogue in Melbourne in December 2019, coordinated by the Australia India Institute. The VC also extended an invitation for the Minister to visit the University in December.