Women and girls with disabilities in India are forced into mental hospitals and institutions, where they face unsanitary conditions, risk physical and sexual violence, and experience involuntary treatment, including electroshock therapy, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said today.
As one woman put it, they are "treated worse than animals."
In a new report released today, the HRW found that women forcibly admitted to government institutions and mental hospitals suffer grave abuses and called for the government to take prompt steps to shift from forced institutional care to voluntary community-based services and support for people with disabilities.
"Women and girls with disabilities are dumped in institutions by their family members or police in part because the government is failing to provide appropriate support and services," said Kriti Sharma, researcher at Human Rights Watch.
Sharma further said, "And once they're locked up, their lives are often rife with isolation, fear, and abuse, with no hope of escape."
The Indian Government should immediately order inspections and regular monitoring of all residential facilities - private and government-run - for women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, Human Rights Watch said.
India should also take steps to ensure people with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities can make decisions about their lives and receive treatment on the basis of informed consent.
The 106-page report, "'Treated Worse than Animals': Abuses against Women and Girls with Psychosocial or Intellectual Disabilities in Institutions in India," documents involuntary admission and arbitrary detention in mental hospitals and residential care institutions across India, where women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities experience overcrowding and lack of hygiene, inadequate access to general healthcare, forced treatment - including electroconvulsive therapy - as well as physical, verbal, and sexual violence.
The report also examines the multiple barriers that prevent women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities from reporting abuses and accessing justice.
The Indian Government should pursue urgent legal reforms, including amending two bills currently before parliament, to address these abuses and protect the rights of women and girls with intellectual or psychosocial disabilities, Human Rights Watch said.
The report analyzes the situation of women and girls with disabilities in six cities across India.
Research was conducted from December 2012 through November 2014 in New Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, and Mysore, and is based on more than 200 interviews with women and girls with psychosocial or intellectual disabilities, their families, caretakers, mental health professionals, service providers, government officials, and the police.
Human Rights Watch visited 24 mental hospitals or general hospitals with psychiatric beds, rehabilitation centers, and residential care facilities.
There are no clear official government records or estimates of the prevalence of psychosocial or intellectual disabilities in India. The 2011 census estimates that only 2.21 percent of the Indian population has a disability - including 1.5 million people (0.1 percent of the population) with intellectual disabilities and a mere 722,826 people (0.05 percent of the population) with psychosocial disabilities (such as schizophrenia or bipolar condition).
These figures are strikingly lower than international estimates by the United Nations and World Health Organization which estimate that 15 percent of the world's population lives with a disability.
The Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare claims much higher percentage of the Indian population is affected by psychosocial disabilities with 6-7 percent (74.2 - 86.5 million) affected by "mental disorders" and 1-2 percent (12.4 - 24.7 million) by "serious mental disorders."
India's government launched the National Mental Health Programme in 1982 to provide community-based services, but its reach is limited, said the HRW report.
