What ails education of visually impaired?

Underutilised

Vikas Kumar Yadav, a student of BA (Hons) Hindi IInd year at Hindu College feels helpless when making rounds to the Delhi University library.

 In between attending classes and trying to gain knowledge from wherever possible, he gets hampered by the lack of availability of books in Braille. “Not all books are available in Braille,” he says adding that this lack of Braille books perforce “creates the need of readers (those who read out to the visually impaired). “Also, one cannot entirely rely on the recordings for if there is a wrong pronunciation, then we are left guessing the right word,” says Yadav. 

Probably mindful of this oft-voiced need, the Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley allocated Rs 560 crore to the Department of Disability Affairs under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. A major portion of this amount is being allocated for the over 50 lakh visually impaired people, who account for 18.8 per cent of the differently-abled population in the country. A proposal of 15 new Braille presses has been made.

“Braille is an old technology,” says Vipin Tiwari, head of Equal Opportunities Cell at Delhi University. “Firstly, the Department of Disability Affairs has been created quite recently and secondly there is no mention about what will this money be used for and how.”

Since the allocation has been made for a term of five years, it is important to keep a check on how this huge amount is going to be utilised by the Government authorities.Especially when experts associated with the visually impaired feel “the two existent Braille presses in Delhi are sufficient to cater to the requirement of Braille books.”
 KJ Kuriyan, principal, JPM Senior Secondary School for the Blind, near Hotel Oberoi, emphasises that “it is not the lack of facility, but the lack of implementation” that is hampering the education of the visually challenged. 

“We do get a regular supply of books from the two Braille presses in Delhi, but if NCERT is going to change its entire syllabus then how do I take care of the situation? Ten to 20 new books will of course take time to print in Braille,” adds Kuriyan raising another pertinent issue. However, he also points out the need to improve the situation of the existing Braille presses.

The managers of the Braille presses feel otherwise. “We have all the modern techniques available with us,” says JK Kaul, secretary general of All India Confederation of the Blind informing about the condition of their braille press. 

“Earlier we use to operate with the 6-dot technique for braille, but now we just need to make the data entry in computer and with simple formatting we can print braille books. Even the knowledge of braille is no more a compulsion for the person feeding the data in computer,” he adds, making one wonder about the wisdom of such huge allocations of fund and proposals to introduce new braille presses.

“The problem with the current braille presses is their under-utilisation,” explains Kaul sharing that the braille presses in Lucknow and Odisha are dysfunctional at present “since there is no facility to repair them.

 Though the machines are imported from foreign countries, the Government doesn’t import spare parts and paper in the required amount. So if a machine stops working, there is no provision to restart it and the manpower goes without work for indefinite time periods!” 

This makes one wonder why there is no mention of import of spare parts and trained technicians in the proposed fund allocation. When our Government can afford printing machines worth Rs 20 crores then is one crore too much for its maintenance?