World Braille Day: DU’s IP College is paving path for an inclusive campus
Delhi University’s first Centre for Disability Studies opens at Indraprastha College for Women, today. Students enrolled in various courses at the college express their excitement, hopes, and aspirations as the initiative kicks off to make their educational journey a more inclusive experience.
Touching the tips of her fingers, to read a script that’s written using six dots typed on embossed paper, Muskan Kapur, a final year student of Hindi (Hons), at Indraprastha College for Women recalls the words of French educator Louis Braille: “Live without seeing, but be what you are.”
The inventor of Braille — used globally as a system of reading and writing for the visually impaired — is remembered today on World Braille Day, by this youngster and her college mates. Henceforth, the date will be remembered by them as the day when the Centre for Disability Studies came up in their college.
“It’s among the first of its kinds in this varsity,” informs Kapur, who is feels happy imagining how it will help many students like her incorporate Braille script in their curriculum. “Classroom mein humein library se recorders provide kiye jaate hain. Pages Braille mein hote hain. Lekin sab log Braille nahi samajh paate. If more centres like these come up, then even those who are not visually impaired will get a platform to learn Braille, and the urge to do so might follow soon,” adds Kapur.
Not knowing Braille does create a communication gap between the teachers and students, feels Sukriti Suri, a second-year student of History (Hons) at IP College, and shares, “Visually impaired students, like myself, always need to rely on scribes. Be it for assignments or for examinations, we just cannot be independent. But with centres like these coming in, I feel other students who otherwise feel shocked seeing our typing devices in classrooms will get used to them. I use Orbit Reader 20, which has six keys for me to type. But students don’t know it, always ask me how am I able to type on my device and why doesn’t it have 26 or more buttons like a keyboard.”
Talks like these might be ignored as minor, but often they stay in the memory of differently abled as hurtful incidents. To reduce these, the new Centre for Disability Research will aim to take the right step towards more inclusivity and acceptance of Braille. BR Alamelu, assistant professor at the college, who will be heading this centre, shares, “During my college days, the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act didn’t exist. So there was no scope for a barrier-free environment, not even in its preliminary stage. But now, it’s not the same.”
Informing that the college conducts sensitivity training, workshops, and conferences to raise awareness about people with disabilities, Alamelu adds, “Louis Braille’s birth anniversary holds special meaning, and hence we decided to open the centre on this date... Here, other than workshops about Braille, we will also provide an inclusive place for other ailments including the introduction of Indian Sign Language, in the next semester, as a diploma course.”
Talk of inclusivity and final year English (Hons) student Anushca Gupta’s hopes rise high. She has cerebral palsy, and shares, “The awareness about cerebral palsy is still quite low, and a lot of people get scared when they hear the term. In fact, when I was wanting to pursue higher education, I got calls from various colleges advising me to not take admission in them because of lack of accessibility such as unavailability of ramps and lifts, and stated ‘Classes kaafi door-door hain, aapse ho nahi payega. Aap naam katwa lo ya kahin aur admission le lo’... Luckily I got admission in IP, and now I hope this new centre encouraged more youngsters with conditions like me to think if I can do it then so can they.”
Author tweets @KritiKambiri