Bureaucrats deprived a disabled professor of the opportunity to legitimize the deferral of his son from conscription

But her misadventures didn’t end there. Three years later, the woman had to go through new trials, this time while collecting medical certificates confirming the reasons for deferring her son’s military service. Such a delay is due if the mother is a disabled person of the first group, needs constant care, and the son is the only close relative who is able to provide this care. And Irina without her son is nowhere.

Tracking software

Against the backdrop of all the events that are taking place now, many have already forgotten what happened in the spring of 2020. In general, it’s also sad, but for a different reason. Many have not yet been sick, but they were already afraid. And it is not clear what was more terrible: COVID-19 unknown to science or the fight against it, which actually turned into a fight against the sick.

Those citizens who were diagnosed with the infection were ordered to lock themselves in their apartment for two weeks and not go out anywhere. People were ordered to download the Social Monitoring application to their phones, which tracked their location and could at any time be required to send a selfie to check their geolocation. These, to put it mildly, strange rules had to be followed daily. Those who did not send a photo in time (for example, slept) could be fined.

The most annoying thing is that the application happened to be buggy – for example, people living on the border of Moscow and the region went out to the balcony to get some fresh air and, according to monitoring data, allegedly ended up in another region. “MK” wrote about the most incredible jambs of this system. In general, there were no federal laws regulating the transformation of people into voluntary prisoners. But this was of little concern. It was later, when millions began to get sick, it was not up to which of the patients and where they were, but the “pioneers” of the coronavirus got it in full.

A teacher at a large university, Irina Karabulatova, did not have a tracking application at all. She did not know about him, although this – as it turned out – was mentioned in the documents that the patient signed during the doctor’s visit. The woman was fined twice. Explanations – “how so, turn on common sense: in any case, a person with a 97% impairment of motor functions will not physically be able to move around the city on his own” – did not bother anyone.

“Yes, I am the same unfortunate heroine from the reports who was lying on the bed and had to prove that she had not gone anywhere in two weeks of self-isolation. To whom I didn’t complain, everything was useless, no one even wanted to listen to me, and only when journalists got involved in the case and showed several stories about my problem, the Prosecutor General’s Office recognized that the penalties were unlawful, and the fines were removed,” recalls Irina Karabulatova Now.

“What if she gets up and goes?”

Unfortunately, over the past three years, her health has deteriorated, and since January 2023, the woman has the first disability group indefinitely. Although she still leads graduate students and receives invitations to foreign scientific conferences, where her only son accompanies her. He also takes care of his mother. Irina has no other close relatives.

Caring for a seriously ill mother, Mikhail Karabulatov studies at the music school at the conservatory. She is graduating this summer. At the end of March, he, like tens of thousands of Muscovites of military age, received a summons to appear at the military registration and enlistment office to clarify his credentials.

There was another reason to go to the military registration and enlistment office. The fact is that the mother received an invitation to China to an authoritative international conference. Only her son could accompany her there, and permission had to be obtained for his trip.

“Together we went to the district military registration and enlistment office on March 21 with all my documents, plus IPRA (individual program for the rehabilitation of a disabled person. — Auth.), which indicated that I needed help, plus a certificate from the MFC that we live together, plus a certificate from a single mother, – says Irina Karabulatova. “Everyone looked there and said that it was also necessary to obtain a conclusion from a medical and social examination, which would indicate that I needed care.”

The trip to China took place. There, Irina, by the way, was awarded the title of honorary professor of a leading Chinese university.

After returning, the collection of documents necessary to grant Mikhail a deferment from conscription continued. Mikhail went to the ITU Bureau 80, where he was told that in order to be released, his mother must undergo a new medical examination.

We contacted the district clinic to get a referral for an examination. There, according to Irina, they were even dumbfounded by their question, because “such a requirement contradicts the very definition of the first group.” But, since this was asked at the bureau, we decided that it was okay, let him go through all the examinations again. According to the law, if there is a summons from the military registration and enlistment office, doctors are required to issue such an examination within three days without additional examinations and delays. However, in this case, the system for some reason glitched, obviously, just like it was during the pandemic. Not only did she not see a living paralyzed person in front of her, but she even interprets the existing laws as she wants.

“We explained all this, and more than once, that there are legal norms in force, but in response we received that it was necessary to go through the entire commission again.”

From April 26 to May 7, 2023, Irina Karabulatova was at the next stage of treatment in Kurgan. She had to have an operation. The moment was very nervous.

“On the very day of the operation, doctors from the clinic suddenly began to call me, they said that I was not at home, so they could not examine me. They only apologized when I explained to them that I was lying on a surgical table in another city.

The operation consisted of placing two electrodes on the spinal cord membrane. In no case should one be alarmed, since at the same time the nerves and muscles could involuntarily contract. And so it happened. As a result, one electrode, according to her, broke inside Irina. I had to urgently operate a second time.

Upon returning to Moscow, they again turned to the clinic. But the documents there, as the heroine says, began to draw up only at the end of May. “I had to wait especially long for a certificate from social security that I do not have a social worker and my son is taking care of me. When the polyclinic submitted the documents, the answer again came that supposedly I had not yet passed some important examinations. Moreover, those analyzes were indicated that were definitely in the map. Then they wrote me the need for additional studies, which do not add anything to the picture of the disease, because spinal cord injury and tetraparesis (a pathological disorder characterized by a decrease in the motor activity of the arms and legs. — Auth.) will not go anywhere. We turned to a paid polyclinic, since the state did not have some of the specialists that I had to go through, I sent a complaint to the main bureau of the ITU through the website. I received a strange answer – they say that I did not order any certificate in January, well, yes, I described the situation that occurred in March.

Irina called the “hot line”, wrote a statement to the prosecutor’s office – the issue is not being resolved.

Can’t beat the system?

But in the bureau of medical and social examination of Karabulatova, they answered that they had received a referral from the city polyclinic for a medical and social examination in her name, indicating the purpose of the examination as determining the need for health reasons in constant outside care (assistance, supervision) of the father, mother, wife, brother, sister, grandfather, grandmother or adoptive parent of citizens called up for military service. “The purpose of the examination provides that your relative has a special status of a citizen called up for military service. There is no information about (…) status in the provided medical documents. Based on this, it is not possible to make a decision on the presence of need for health reasons (…).” However, Irina was immediately reassured that if “the status of your relative” changes, you can apply again. “I don’t understand anything at all, because the son’s summons was handed to them against receipt, how they didn’t see it and don’t understand why I need an examination.”

Since March, mother and son have been unable to obtain an important document that will determine the fate of a young man, although the very requirement to obtain this document, in theory, conflicts with the federal law on social support for the disabled.

“At the same time, it seems to me, mutual responsibility and a disregard for work are being created. It feels like I’m back again during the pandemic. Or is the system taking revenge on me for the fact that I managed to defeat it last time? my interlocutor thinks. – Is it not necessary to take into account such parameters as the completeness of the family, the presence and degree of illness / disability of recruits and their families, the presence, degree of disability of direct relatives, the duration of the disability? Then, I think, many questions would have been removed at once. Now these documents are submitted by the polyclinic, while the disabled person himself does not know which of the documents provided by him was sent, what they received, this ultimately leads to the fact that no one needs anything, and they just give up.”

Irina Karabulatova appealed to the State Duma, to the deputy who is directly involved in the affairs of the disabled. She says she hasn’t received a response yet. “There is only time until July 10, while the son is still considered a student. Then he is called. He takes exams at the university, at the same time running around doctors and commissions. Despite my condition, despite federal laws, no one can hear us. And I just don’t know what and how to do…”

I listen to her story and understand what it reminds me of: Arkady Raikin’s ancient humoresque, where his hero, a bureaucrat, demands countless certificates, including “certificate that you need a certificate.” But there it looked funny. Although it showed all the impenetrable stupidity of officials. Nothing has changed since then. In addition, in this particular situation, it is practically a matter of life and death. Irina is nowhere without her son.

There is a federal law that the only relative of a disabled person of the first group, caring for him, is not subject to military service. And it is necessary that this legislative norm be observed.

“What kind of help, support for the disabled can we talk about when people do what they want on the ground? I am afraid that this creates conditions for abuse with the cultivation of a sense of one’s own impunity,” says Irina Karabulatova. – I am very bitter that they are trying to drag me into a scandal again, provoking a public discussion of my problem, but I see no other way out but to turn to the newspaper. Chained to the bed, I’m tired of fighting.”

PS The editors of “MK” convincingly ask the competent authorities to understand the current situation and help the disabled person.