Vodafone in aid of the hearing impaired

Releases special pre-paid card for them

A hundred and thirty years after the invention of telephone, cellular technology will finally take the device to people with special abilities.

In a first of its kind initiative and available only in Kolkata, mobile services provider Vodafone Essar, has launched the 'Sambhav' prepaid card, targeted at customers with hearing and speech disability.

Available at Rs 151, the prepaid Sambhav card will enable the hearing impaired to communicate effectively using a cellphone. The card enables customers with hearing and speech disability to use mobile phones primarily for sending SMSes.

The card which provides 500 free smses also has Rs 10 worth of calls for any emergency.

The card introduced in Kolkata on a pilot basis will be rolled out in the rest of the country eventually depending on the success of the experiment, says Vodafone Essar East ceo, Sridhar Rao.

Rao says he has no problem if people other than the hearing impaired use it. But a call costs Rs 1.99 which is more than what other Vodafone options offer, he says.

The special card called Sambhav was made after an NGO, International Deaf Children's Society, India, approached the company. It was tailor-made for deaf children.

Vodafone, in Kolkata, has joined hands with the IDCS to ensure that the service reaches the maximum number of special people.

According to Sridhar Rao, voice service is redundant for the hearing and speech impaired. Instead, they require to communicate through text.

"At Vodafone, we have been offering tailor-made services for various corporate clients as well as others. So we thought of launching a product tailor-made for people who fail to use a cellphone, like the deaf. Since, telecom is all about communication, we thought of introducing a product for the hearing impaired as well, to enable them to communicate too, using this technology," Rao said.

"Today, we have technology that allows one to communicate without having to hear or speak. We felt those with speech and hearing disability should not be deprived of the opportunity to communicate," Rao said.

In addition, a Vodafone team will hold SMS workshops at institutes partnering with IDCS, to educate the disabled on how to write and access SMS on their mobile phones.

The Sambhav card offers 500 local SMS for Rs 151 per month.

The card is valid for one month and is available across 15 Vodafone stores and 68 Vodafone mini-stores in Kolkata.

The card also has a talk-time of Rs 10 for emergency purposes.

According to Sandhya Srinivasan, communications officer of IDCS, there are 12 million deaf people in India. Over 25,000 deaf children are born across India every year.

"When the telephone was invented as a means of communication, the deaf were left behind. With technology now available for the deaf to communicate, hopefully, this will not happen now," Srinivasan said.