Unpacking Disability and Education within an Inclusive School in Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR)

While the recent policies of the Indian state emphasise inclusive education as an ideal model of education, thereby gaining traction and acceptance in India, its implementation remains fraught with complexities. This paper, based on a year-long ethnographic study, examines the inclusive schooling practices at a ‘model’ school in the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR), focusing on the lived experiences of students with disabilities. By understanding disability as a site of social exclusion, discrimination, and oppression, the paper dissects how the model of inclusive education conceptualised in the Global North, often ignorant of the local realities, is implemented in a school in the Global South. This study uses shadow teachers (an additional support system within mainstream schools) as a key lens to explore how academic and social accessibility for disabled students is navigated. It also delves into the often-overlooked home-school relationships, emphasising how these dynamics influence inclusion. Through the frameworks of critical pedagogy, anti-oppressive pedagogy, and ableism, the paper explores how power, place, and intersectional identities interact within and beyond school walls. It looks into the questions of epistemic and ontological justice by examining whose knowledge and experiences are validated within the formalised educational system, and whose are not. By centering on how disabled students’ ways of knowing and being are treated, it addresses broader questions of justice in education. The school, as a socio-cultural site, reveals the tensions between policy and practice, highlighting the barriers to and potential for inclusion. The school has borne witness to the evolving policies of the state and the impact of a global pandemic, making it an arena where educational policies are translated into lived experiences, requiring meticulous documentation. In doing so, it engages deeply with questions of power, justice, and organisational diversity in the context of the Global South.