Sunday, November 30, 2014

Laptops given to blind students in Odisha

Taken from Times of India.
BHUBANESHWAR: The state government on Monday distributed laptops free of cost to 100 visually challenged students to encourage them to pursue higher education.

The students, including 50 girls, who are studying for graduation and higher studies in arts, science, engineering and other streams, received the specially customized laptops at Bhima Bhoi Blind School here. "This initiative is among the first of its kind in the country. The move will encourage more visually impaired students to pursue higher education as well as improve their ability to compete with other students," said state disability welfare minister Pranab Prakash Das. Each laptop costs Rs 53,000 and are equipped with screen readers with a voice synthesizer that converts keyboard commands into human-sounding speech. All the laptops are loaded with a specially designed software JAWS for Windows, official sources said. "The department has spent a total Rs 50 lakh on the scheme. In the first phase, we selected 100 students and more visually impaired students will be included in the scheme later," said director of the Directorate of Welfare of People with Disabilities B B Patnaik. "The JAWS software provides key command equivalents to mouse functions to enable students to navigate their laptops, read documents and browse the Internet. The software costs Rs 20,000 per laptop," added Patnaik. Visually impaired students applied to the women and child development department for free laptops and in the first phase, 100 students were selected. The students were selected on the basis of recommendations made by principals of the colleges. Criteria such as family background and branch of study were not considered. A two-day training session on basic computer operations was also organized for the beneficiaries.

Ramesh Chandra Mahanta, a visually challenged PhD scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University, said, "No Braille books are available for students pursuing higher education. Students use recorded audio cassettes as study material. These laptops will enable students to read as many books as they want as the software will read out scanned texts."
Leenalata Sahu, a Plus III final-year student of Rama Devi Women's (Autonomous) College, said, "The laptops will improve our ability and increase access to the Internet. It is also a kind of morale boost for the students who are usually looked down upon in society." Each student was given a Braille guide,
an audio guide and a DVD to operate the laptop and special software.

Source: Times of India.

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