Blind to Visionaries Trust - B2V

I (Dr. T K Bansal, M.Tech, Ph.D. (IIT Delhi), PDF (University of Oxford, UK), Former Senior Lecturer, Physics (IIT Kharagpur)), blind myself, firmly b Read moreelieve that the blind is much more intelligent than the people believe they are. They can work with immense concentration and can do wonders if proper guidance is provided. With a little help and encouragement, it can be shown that blind is an asset for the society and not a liability. I wish to convey that as per a report published in The Indian Express in the year 2015, India has 4.7 crore people with moderate or severe vision impairment out of which 88 Lakh are blind. The life of a blind person in India is miserable. Although education is a fundamental right of every child, the blind and the visually impaired children are not sent to school and are considered to be a curse. On the other hand, those blind children that are sent to schools are not dealt with properly, and not many books are available to them. In a recent RTI to NCERT, about the accessible science and mathematics books have revealed that tactile books for only Class 6 have been prepared and even those are yet not published and are out of reach of the blind students. I, a 100% blind person myself, is unable to understand that why the society and the nation as a whole are not considerate and feel it as a responsibility to educate the visually impaired and blind students. In the year 1980, When I came to Delhi for my M.Tech. studies at IIT Delhi, Doctors at AIIMS told me that I am suffering from Retinitis pigmentosa and will eventually go blind. I was broken and shed tears for many days and sought help from all my nears and dears, but all in vain. I then decided that education is the only one that will stand by me. I, therefore, started working very very hard and stood first in my class at IIT Delhi. I then completed my Ph.D. from IIT Delhi and then joined the University of Oxford, Oxford, UK, for my postdoctoral work under the Government of India scholarship for study abroad. On coming back to India, I joined IIT Kharagpur as a senior lecturer in Physics. Yet another jolt, I had to leave IIT Kharagpur due to my poor eyesight. And started teaching students for IIT JEE In Delhi. Even today, at the age of 62, I firmly believe that education is the only thing that can improve the life of 4.77 crores blind and visually impaired members of our society.  In the pursuit of helping the blind students, I visited several blind schools and found that the organizers of these schools feel that blind students can not do anything. That is why they are taught only in braille and that too only in their regional language. Moreover, the teachers are unable to motivate them, rather they discourage them. As a whole, the life of a blind student is awful. Not only the children but even the parents are also in a very bad condition because of neither of the mainstream schools are ready to take the blind and visually impaired students and not many books or study materials are available for blind students