Visually impaired students have found a new avenue to access books online. The country's first online Braille library, with 12,000 books in its catalogue, was launched in Mumbai last week and will cater to students pursuing higher education in institutions across India.
It is a joint initiative by the National Institute of Visually Handicapped (NIVH), Dehradun and the Xavier's Resource Centre for Visually Challenged, Mumbai. The library allows students to download books and read them through refreshable Braille display systems (RBDS). The initiative has a website that will host members, which would be the institute's libraries across the country. The libraries have been given a username and a password.
The libraries will upload all books available to their online catalogue. To gain access, a student needs to login with the institute's username and password. The books can then be downloaded instantly and transferred to the RBDS (a flat horizontal monitor consisting of 80 cells). The download appears on the screen of RBDS as raised units for the students to read.
Anuradha Mohit, director, NIVH, said, "Now we have a generation of young computer users among blind persons. Therefore, the launch has been very timely." Though, she admitted the technology is not as advanced as that in developed nations, she informed this was a good start.
The RBDS would enable students to read only one to two sentences at a time.
100 such monitors have been dispatched by the NIVH, which will be used on a shared basis by students.
The portal has books in 13 languages that display text in the corresponding Braille script. Mohit said by March 2013, they aim to have books in all the Indian languages. She added that with the bulk purchase of RBDS, it's hoped the cost of equipment would come down. Students will then have more such devices at their disposal. Students, however, will have to wait for some time to access the library, as several institutes are yet to receive the RBDS devices.
