The Hindu : New Delhi News : Preparing the visually challenged for IT jobs

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Preparing the visually challenged for IT jobs

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: The All-India Confederation of the Blind in collaboration with Amway Opportunity Foundation is launching a brand new initiative at Braille Bhawan in Sector 5 of Rohini here this Sunday to provide employment opportunities to visually impaired men and women.

Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit is expected to inaugurate the “AOF-AICB Centre for Excellence” (Information Technology for the Visually Challenged). The function will be presided over by AOF chairman William S. Pinchney.

Remunerative work

According to All-India Confederation of the Blind secretary-general J.L. Kaul, the project seeks to prepare visually impaired youngsters for remunerative work at par with their counterparts in the Information Technology sector. It is a unique step to empower them with skills required in the job market.

Pointing out that the project would undertake training courses of two types, Mr. Kaul said: “Firstly it would admit 12 visually impaired young persons from across the country to totally job-oriented IT courses of 12 months’ duration each. It would prepare them for challenging work opportunities such as technical writing, search engine optimisation and call centre executives. Conscious efforts would be made to secure jobs for persons trained in the BPO and allied sectors.”

From various States

Candidates from Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Kolkata, Kerala, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh have been admitted to the first course.

The other component of the project concentrates on providing basic word processing and Internet exploring skills to college-going visually impaired young boys and girls. Each course will be of four months with an intake of eight students. A total of 24 students would benefit during the year.

Helpful to girls

Asserting that the second course would enable students, predominantly girls, to perform their educational assignments independently, Mr. Kaul said: “They will take their examinations without scribes and access their study material on the Internet. The project is different from other computer-related training courses running across the country. It is closely related to the job profiles of the IT sector and the educational requirements of college students.”

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