A decade after the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act was passed, its vision of empowering people with disabilities and removing barriers to accessing justice is unfulfilled.This failure is most evident in the functioning of the Office of the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities and its state counterparts, even though they were strengthened as part of the 2016 law to ensure substantive rights and meaningful access to justice for disabled persons.The 2016 act envisaged a government-wide effort, requiring ministries, departments and public institutions to review and align their laws, policies, procedures and practices with its mandate.In the absence of these reforms, persons with disabilities have been forced to assert their rights one legal case at a time. Contradictions in employment, education, accessibility, and public services quickly surfaced, with many disputes reaching the courts and generating a growing body of disability jurisprudence.However, litigation was meant to be the exception, not the primary mechanism for securing rights guaranteed by law.Persons with disabilities display placards near a newly inaugurated public park named saying that the facility is not disability friendly, during a demonstration in Chennai in June 2022. Credit: AFP.Here, the Office of the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities and its state counterparts were supposed to address such concerns brought before them and order corrective measures. But rather than envisioning a robust quasi-judicial body capable of enforcing disability rights, Parliament replicated the model of the National Human Rights Commission.This choice imported the structure of the National Human Rights Commission and also its limitations: commissioners can investigate and recommend, but lack binding enforcement powers, raising longstanding concerns about their ability to secure meaningful remedies.Further, there has been no full-time Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities since 2019, a lawyer for the petitioner in the Rajive Raturi case told the Supreme Court on July 29. The court, during the hearing, also noted that 10 states had yet to appoint State Commissioners. It has sought compliance by the next hearing in January 2027.The result is a deliberate paradox where rights are generously inscribed into law but the institutions meant to enforce them are starved of real authority.Chronic dysfunctionalityDuring parliamentary debates on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, concerns were raised about whether institutions like the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities and its state counterparts had been equipped to fulfil that promise.In Lok Sabha, Congress member KC Venugopal argued that the Commissioners required greater powers. Telangana Rashtra Samithi member Kavitha Kalvakuntla questioned the persistent disregard of commissioners’ orders by courts and public authorities, warning that such institutional weakness would undermine the rights-based framework the legislation sought to establish.Those concerns were never adequately addressed.Consider a person who brings a complaint to the commissioners under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016. There are, in effect, two destinations. Either the Commissioner rules against them. Or the Commissioner finds their favour, but the ruling is only a recommendation, which can be ignored.Under Sections 76 and 81 of the Act, the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities may recommend that an authority act within three months, but it cannot compel the authority to act. The consequences of this design failure are visible in the data. Between 2020 and 2023, the Chief Commissioner issued 513 recommendations to 32 ministries and departments. Some action was taken in only 148 cases, which means a compliance rate of just 29%, said the report.Visually impaired and physically challenged activists during a protest demanding government welfare policies on the eve of ‘international day for Persons with Disabilities’, in Chennai on December 2, 2022. Credit: AFP. Put differently, nearly three out of every four recommendations issued by the statutory disability regulator were ignored. The Ministry of Railways accounted for the highest number of pending recommendations, underscoring the persistent gap between legal obligations and administrative action. The government’s response to a question in Lok Sabha in 2024 conceded that it lacks an explanation for this non-compliance and any mechanism to compel ministries to act. The reply stated that reasons for not forwarding Action Taken Reports or non-acceptance of recommendations by ministries/departments despite statutory provisions and reminders from the Office of Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities is “not known”.A rights-enforcement body whose recommendations can be disregarded with impunity offers a remedy in form, but not necessarily in substance.The annual report of the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities, last published for 2022, tells a story of institutional retreat. Complaint registrations and disposals have both fallen by 39% since 2014.In a petition before the Supreme Court filed in September 2024 by disability rights activist Satendra Singh, the government’s figures completed the picture.In 2024, the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities issued recommendations to primarily ministries and government departments in 107 cases, showed a counter affidavit filed by the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities. Two in three drew no response, around 28 were actually implemented. Three years ago, non-response accounted for six in 10 recommendations, according to the counter affidavit. Today it is seven in 10.The state’s absence of political will to ensure an efficient remedy is further evident in the budgetary allocations made to the Commission. In the 2024-’25 financial year budget, the Central Information Commission received Rs. 42.49 crore, the National Human Rights Commission Rs 75.53 crore, and the National Green Tribunal Rs 52.68 crore. The Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities, in comparison, got Rs 5.5 crore and did not even spend the full amount – Rs 4.54 crore.Rights and remediesIt is a settled principle in law: where there is a right, there must be a remedy. For most complainants with disabilities who win their cases, the problem is that the ruling ends on paper.A grievance body that cannot enforce its findings creates the fiction of a remedy, draws in complaints, attempts resolution, but delivers relief in only a fraction of cases, that too after months of paperwork and hearings that exhaust already vulnerable people.The asymmetry that the act was meant to correct between a lone citizen with disability and a well-resourced employer or state becomes entrenched rather than challenged.The mechanism of such inaction is simple: the state points to the Commission, which points to its recommendations. The disabled citizen is left with a paper that carries no weight. It is a system that drains time, energy and hope while offering little in the way of effective redress. For complainants already exhausted by disability and discrimination, this erodes both energy and trust in the system itself.Shrutika Pandey is a lawyer and researcher working on issues of access to justice with a focus on persons with disabilities. She leads the Access to Justice Network at Nyaaya and manages the Samvidhaan Fellowship currently active in Bihar, Karnataka and Maharashtra.Shashank Pandey is a legal professional and founder of the Politics and Disability Forum, with a focus on fostering inclusivity in legal and political systems.Views are personal.