India’s 40 to 90 million disabled people can generate higher economic growth benefiting the country, reveals a World Bank report. “Increasing the status, and social and economic participation of people with disabilities would have positive effects on everyone, not just disabled people,” Philip O’Keefe— the main author of the report —says.

However, the report laments that people with disabilities are among the most excluded in Indian society. Low literacy and employment rates and widespread social stigma are leaving disabled people behind. As India makes economic progress, the incidence of communicable disease-induced disabilities such as polio are likely to fall, whereas age and lifestyle-related disabilities and those due to traffic accidents are expected to rise sharply, the report warns.

The report highlights the need for a multi-faceted approach so that disabled people realize their full individual potential and maximize their social and economic contribution to society.

The report finds that people with disabilities are subject to many deprivations. Households with disabled members are significantly poorer than average, with lower consumption and fewer assets.

Children living with disability are around 4 to 5 times less likely to be in school than Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Caste children. Disabled adults also have far lower employment rates than the general population — and this fell from 43 per cent in 1991 to 38 per cent in 2002, even in the midst of economic growth.

The report explains that social attitudes and stigma play an important role in limiting the opportunities of the disabled for full participation in social and economic life, often even within their own families.

For example, in surveys carried out for the report, around 50 per cent of the households saw the cause of disability as a “curse of God”.