A person can reach a government office and still be denied meaningful access to a service. The entrance may be open, the form available and the official polite. Yet the visitor may leave without knowing who will deal with the request, what happens next or whether another exhausting journey will be necessary.
We often treat accessibility as a feature of a building or website. But access is also a question of responsibility: can someone complete the journey from asking for help to receiving a decision?
That question feels particularly urgent after The Kashmir Pulse reported on October 21 that the J&K Handicapped Association had protested in Srinagar. Among its demands were accessible public offices, banking services, websites and mobile applications; greater participation in decision-making; and action on disability-related employment and social protection. The association also raised concerns about the appointment of a Disability Commissioner. Those are reported demands, not findings independently investigated for this article.
I write as someone who has managed adult social care services in England, not as an eyewitness to conditions in Kashmir. The law, resources and institutions differ. The people best placed to explain what is failing in Jammu and Kashmir are those using its services, especially persons with disabilities and the organisations representing them. But practical management questions can help turn a public promise into something people can test.
A service is not accessible until the whole journey works
Imagine a person visiting an office about an application. The first counter sends them to another department. The second asks for paperwork the first never mentioned. On returning, the person learns that the case cannot be located. This example is hypothetical. Its purpose is to expose how a system can transfer inconvenience to the individual while recording that every office has “responded”.
For somebody facing mobility, communication or digital barriers, a failed handover may carry additional costs in travel, assistance, income and energy. We should not expect people to become expert navigators of bureaucracy just to exercise an ordinary right.
Here are five practical changes public bodies could consider, with local disability advocates helping decide what is feasible and what matters most.
1. Give every request a clear next step
When an enquiry moves to another team, the person should receive a simple acknowledgement: what has been requested, which office or role owns the next action, how to seek an update and when to expect one. This need not require an expensive new technology platform. A reference number, accessible written note or agreed telephone follow-up may be enough for some services.
The point is not another piece of paper. It is an end to the sentence “We sent it somewhere else” as the final answer.
2. Test accessibility beyond the front door
An accessibility assessment should follow the full experience: arrival, queue, communication, form, supporting evidence, decision and any appeal. Can a person find the correct desk? Is information available in suitable formats? Can digital forms actually be completed with assistive technology? Are alternatives available when an online route is inaccessible?
The answers must come partly from users themselves. A checklist designed without disabled people can miss the barriers that determine whether a service works in practice.
3. Stop asking people to repeat what the institution already knows
Where lawful and appropriate, teams should securely transfer the essential information already supplied. Clear records and consent arrangements can protect privacy while reducing repeated journeys and explanations. More data-sharing is not automatically better; only necessary information should follow the case.
A good handover should spare the citizen from carrying an institution’s memory.
4. Make complaints lead to visible improvement
A complaints channel is useful only if somebody can understand it, use it and obtain a response. Public offices could review recurring accessibility problems with disability organisations and publish plain-language updates showing which barriers were reported, which actions have owners and what remains unresolved.
This would not replace formal legal remedies or oversight. It would make everyday learning visible rather than waiting until frustration becomes a protest.
5. Measure the burden on people, not just activity by departments
A department may count applications received or messages forwarded. Citizens experience unanswered questions, avoidable return visits and time without a decision. Those measures are different.
A modest pilot in one service could track, over an agreed review period, the proportion of enquiries with a named next step, how often applicants are asked to resubmit information, whether accessible communication was provided and whether people understood the outcome. Findings should be reviewed with disabled service users and published in a form that protects personal data.
Such a pilot would not prove that every wider structural problem had been solved. It would show whether one service was getting easier to use.
Rights need ownership, not merely reassurance
These operational changes are no substitute for the legal protections, representation, resources or institutional action sought by disability advocates in Jammu and Kashmir. In particular, the October protest’s demands concerning the Disability Commissioner and wider protections deserve direct public answers from the responsible authorities. Administrative improvements should support accountability, not be used to deflect those questions.
There are real trade-offs. Staff may be overstretched; budgets and infrastructure may be limited; privacy and procedural safeguards matter. For that reason, start with a service journey and listen to the people living with its failures. Agree what can change immediately, what requires funding or policy decisions, and who will report back.
Leadership is sometimes described through speeches, strategies and announcements. But the person who has made three journeys to the same office judges leadership differently.
The useful question is not simply whether the door was open. It is whether someone could come through it, be heard and leave knowing what would happen next — without having to fight the same battle tomorrow.
About the Author: Mafalda Carvalho is a UK-based author, speaker and HR consultant, and founder of Prestige Care Consulting. Her experience includes adult social care management in England. Her writing focuses on leadership, inclusion and the practical implementation of organisational change.
