Faisalabad: February 6, 2011. (PCP) On 2nd February 2011, Association of Women for Awareness and Motivation (AWAM) organized a consultation meeting on the theme “Mainstreaming Women with Disabilities for their Empowerment” held at Quilim Restaurant in Faisalabad. The prime objective of the consultation was to discuss the challenges confronting persons with disabilities (PWDs), and to engage stakeholders in strategic planning to tackle the challenges of PWDs through a participatory approach. This consultation was joined by 27 participants from government departments, special educational institutes, media, women with disabilities and civil society organizations. During the consultation, Naseem Anthony (Executive Secretary-AWAM) and Shazia George (Coordinator-AWAM) highlighted the different issues and concerns of people with disabilities through a presentation, and emphasised the need to bridge the gap between government machinery and civil society for protecting and advocating rights of PWDs. At this juncture, Ashiq Hussain Dogar (EDO-CD), Sarfraz Ahmed (DO-Social Welfare), Dr. Zahida Naz, Khalida Rafiq (Superintendent-Dar-ul-Amaan), Iftikhar Ahmed (Journalist), Qadeer Sikandar (Journalist) and George Clement (Former Parliamentarian) were also present. The participants of the consultation through participatory exercise recommended following measures in order to mitigate the sufferings of people with disabilities that: The availability of registration form in Urdu along with English (or bi-lingual) must be ensured, and necessary information about the registration process must be attached with the registration form in written form; The registration process must be shortened, and disability registration certificate must be issued within one or two weeks, and should be sent to PWDs through postal services; The authorities should start one-window operation to register the persons with disabilities preferably through social welfare department, whereas the rest of the registration process should be completed through the coordination between social welfare and labour departments; The authorities must issue duplicate registration certificate rather than repeating the whole process of registration, after submission of application by PWDs in case of misplacement of original registration certificate, and the data of PWDs must be computerized to avoid the duplication and omissions; Every Tehsil Headquarter (THQ) Hospital as well as District Headquarter (DHQ) Hospital should be authorized to issue disability registration certificate keeping in view the problems facing persons with disabilities in mobility; The authorities should appoint a lady doctor along with male district surgeon to complete the initial assessment step for girls/women with disabilities; All concerned offices must be accessible and established on ground floor in order to avoid sufferings faced by persons with disabilities during passing through stairs instead of ramp or elevator; The authorities should take pertinent steps based on universally accepted standards, for ensuring easy access of people with disabilities to public buildings and places, and must reserve at least one toilet/washroom in all concerned offices, and must make them easily accessible and usable for persons with disabilities; The authorities should take appropriate measures such as; free transport facility and reserved seats in public transports, to remove the barriers that prevent a person with disability from participating in an activity or receiving services on an equal basis with others. At this juncture, Ashiq Hussain Dogar ensured to start a mobile service to register people with disabilities at the union council level, and to form team of mobile unit consisting of doctor, medical board and representatives of NGOs. Iftikhar Ahmed ensured to design software/database for the registration of persons with disabilities in order to avoid duplication and lengthy registration process, and committed to launch web portal for the awareness and information among persons with disabilities about the registration process.