Abstract
The Indian state relates to the category of disability—and materialises itself—through the distribution, often at camps, of aids and appliances such as hearing aids, canes and wheelchairs that are ‘make in India’, as examples. In 2014, the state modernised its distribution programme and started providing cochlear implants to children living below the poverty line. While aspirations exist to create and manufacture an Indian-made cochlear implant, currently the state purchases implants from three multinational corporations. This cochlear implant programme reveals new directions in which the state is moving in engaging with disability and introduces novel assemblages of welfare, medicine, rehabilitation and multinational capital. In these assemblages, new relationships form between the state, multinational corporations and families with deaf children. These relationships stretch beyond the one-time disability camp or the one-off surgery and have resulted in opportunities for government administrators, surgeons and rehabilitation professionals to reinvent themselves in relation to the seemingly miraculous power of cochlear implants while also producing complex dependencies for families with deaf children. Families are required to interact with, and depend on, multinational corporations to maintain the cochlear implants.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
