Visually challenged students and teachers from across the State were imparted basic knowledge of modern assistive devices during a three-day programme held at National Institute of Technology- Tiruchi.
The 52 participants, most of them students, besides a few teachers, a librarian and a railway staff, benefited from the residential training programme on use of laptops, smartphones, various associated shortcut keys, basic android accessibility settings, talkback feature and text to speech feature.
The participants of the programme, conducted in association with NIEPVD (National Institute for Empowerment of Persons with Visual Disabilities) under Ministry of Social Justice and empowerment, were also oriented on Apps such as ‘Eye D Pro’, ‘Be my eyes’, that was developed to help the visually impaired (VI) to connect with sighted volunteers for visual assistance.
They were apprised of the legal provisions on access to information and assistive devices under RPD (Rights of Persons with Disabilities) Act, various assistive features available for the visually impaired in banking services and Unified Payment Interface, ease of usage of e-commerce services and Apps of transport aggregators, online shopping and food delivery.
The resource persons also highlighted the utility of online digital libraries.
Mobility tech
The training programme concluded with a brief explanation on the modern technologies used for mobility like smart canes, and navigation Apps.
The trainers who were visually challenged are Jagajothi Voluntary Reader’s Circle for the Visually Impaired, Audio and Braille section, District central library, Tiruchi.
A large number of student volunteers of Pupil for Pupil Committee (PPC), the social outreach arm of the postgraduate students of NITT, took the lead in organising the programme.
Faculty Advisor Sheeba said the objective was to integrate and enhance the impact of the social outreach initiative of the Institute.
Bakthavatsalam, Professor, who led the NITT volunteers, said such a programme for students with special needs was organised for the fourth year in a row
Tagore, Research Officer, NIEPVD, lauded the NITT students for creating more than 1,000 audiobooks in the repository of Trichy district library.
NIT-T Director Mini Shaji Thomas said digital assistive aids had infused confidence and competency in visually challenged people.