TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Contributions to the ABU Newsletter …………………………………4
2. Editor’s Note ………………………………………………………………4
3. A Warm Welcome in Karachi……………………………………………6
4. Pressure Mounts on Tajikistan Government to Adopt UNCRPD…8
5. Visually Impaired Children with Mental Retardation
Receive ABU’s attention in the Middle East…………………………9
6. Legal Literacy for Visually Impaired Women………...................11
7. ABU Women’s Committee Completes an Important
Research Study Pertaining to Domestic Violence
And Emotional Abuse among Women with Visual
Impairment...........................................................................12
8. Tech Talk……………………………………………………….. ……......14
9. Inspiration………………………………………………………………….16
1. CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ABU NEWSLETTER
A number of individuals and organizations have been helpful in providing content for this publication; our most sincere gratitude is due to all of them.
In particular, we appreciate the in-puts and/or support provided by the following:
1. Mr. Ahmed Allousi, President, ABU.
2. Mr. J.L. Kaul, Secretary General, Asian Blind Union;
3. ABU Secretariat Staff;
4. Mr. S.K. Rungta, Chair, Advocacy Committee, ABU;
5. Mr. Davlatov T.B. Chairperson, Public Organization of Blind, Tajikistan;
6. National Association of the Blind, Nepal.
7. Ms. Madhu Singhal, Chairperson, Women’s Committee, ABU;
8. Mr. Dipendra Minocha, President, Daisy Forum of India;
9. Friendship Association of the Blind, Jordan;
10.Ms. Sachu Ramalingam, Secretary, AICB.
We would welcome contributions/content in-puts of information, news, a creative piece, technology related information, any success story of a visually impaired person and/or any other information, which you may wish us to carry in this publication.
Please send your in-puts to aicbdelhi@yahoo.com or abudelhi@rediffmail.com.
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2. EDITOR’S NOTE
At the outset, we extend our most sincere apologies to our readers for the inordinate delay in bringing out the present issue of this newsletter. However, our friends can be rest assured that this delay has occurred due to exceptional and unavoidable circumstances. In future every care will be taken to ensure that the publication is brought out in time.
Continuing this positive note, we are happy to share with our readers that the present issue of the ABU Newsletter (Progress) marks the completion of one year of the recommencement of this publication. It was in June 2009 that the first issue of the newsletter was introduced to you with some new features. The feedback suggests that this publication is being read by hundreds of visually impaired persons in ABU region countries as well as in other parts of the world. This has ensured dissemination of information regarding ABU activities at the grass-roots level, helped people to know more about what is the latest at WBU and Asian Blind Union, provided information about latest trends and inventions in technology and has also made available to a large number of blind and low vision persons, stories of visually impaired achievers.
The continuity of this publication was by no means a smooth task given the fact that information from some countries was not as readily forth coming as we would have liked it to come in. However, it was the enthusiasm of our readers that kept us going. Hopefully, the ABU affiliates will be more keen to share information for the newsletter which in turn, will provide greater variety in this publication.
The April-June quarter (to which this newsletter belongs) is significant from some other point of view as well. It marks the completion of two years of the four year term of Asian Blind Union officers and executive. In the present term not only has the work of the earlier officers of the organization been efficiently carried forward, but also, and quite unusual for an INGO, almost all the targets in terms of the activities have been achieved almost on time. The significance of this achievement is heightened by the consideration that Asian Blind Union has as many as 22 countries as its members belonging to three major sub-regions, each having its peculiar culture, modes of functioning and predominant language.
Another salient feature of the present term of ABU has been its strong emphasis on Advocacy. Partly informed by the underlying philosophy of the organization and partly prompted by the coming into force of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in May, 2008, advocacy and a rights based approach has appeared to have become the life blood of ABU. This is indicated by the conduct of three sub-regional advocacy training workshops in the April-June quarter under report in this newsletter. These workshops have been able to create critical human resource in many affiliates of the Union which will surely strengthen the advocacy work in the coming few years.
It was rather, a happy coincidence the UNCRPD came into force in the ratifying countries in May, 2008, soon after the 4th General Assembly of the Asian Blind Union. The April-June quarter, to which this newsletter pertains, marks also the completion of two years of that important event. Many ABU countries had signed the Convention, but the ratification has been rather slow in a number of its member countries. This is a serious cause of concern for ABU. In the advocacy training workshop, which shall be reported in detail in the following pages, the Union’s affiliates belonging to various countries have been urged to take up the issue of ratification in their respective countries in case it has not been addressed by their respective governments. On the other hand, we have the examples of countries such as Nepal and Bangladesh which have not only ratified the Convention, but also the optional Protocol.
It is rather surprising that even after three years of the signing of the Convention, some of the more developed countries have yet to ratify it. Perhaps an expeditious action on their part will serve as a catalyst for other countries which are yet to take positive steps towards the implementation of UNCRPD.
Dr. Anil Aneja.
Editor.
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3. A Warm Welcome in Karachi
Words of cheer and expressions of friendship and warmth from Mr. Qari Saad Noor, President, Pakistan Association of the Blind, and Mr. Amir Ashraf, the General Secretary, PAB welcomed the delegates as they arrived in Karachi, Pakistan to attend the three day Advocacy Training Workshop held there from 25-27 June, 2010. This event was conducted by the Advocacy Committee of the Asian Blind Union in collaboration with Pakistan Association of the Blind. Incidentally, the President of PAB, Mr. Saad Noor is also the Vice President of Asian Blind Union.
During the informal interactions at dinner itself on 24th June, one realized that the workshop would be a grand success as most of the participants were enthusiastic and committed lot, many of whom were already engaged in intense rights based work in their respective organizations.
The workshop was inaugurated by the Vice President, Asian Blind Union, Mr. Qari Saad Noor. The Chairperson of Pakistan Cricket Association of the Blind was the Guest of Honour. More than 20 participants from 5 countries, namely, Afghanistan, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka took part in this three day workshop.
The structure and contents of the workshop were so designed as to, on one hand, provide the participants with adequate knowledge and understanding about the required advocacy skills and strategies as well as planning and implementation skills relating to advocacy initiatives around given issues, and on the other hand, provide ample opportunity to them to understand and share experiences about the ratification of UNCRPD and the issues concerning ensuring benefits under UNCRPD.
The topics of the workshop included:
1. Advocacy: an Overview in the Context of Historical Perspective of Self Help Movement of the Blind
2. Advocacy: Concept, Tools and Strategies
3. Introduction to UN Convention
4. Ratification and Optional Protocol of UNCRPD: Procedures and implications
5. Networking and creating alliances among NGOs and through media on advocacy issues
6. Implementation, Evaluation and Monitoring of UNCRPD
The above topics as well as other discussions were efficiently conducted by three resource persons, who, among themselves, possessed a variety of skills such as legal knowledge, expertise in communication skills and information technology as well as wide experience of actual rights based work in the area of visual impairment. These resource persons were:
1. Mr. S.K. Rungta, General Secretary, National Federation of the Blind (India) and Chair, Advocacy Committee, Asian Blind Union;
2. Dr. Anil Aneja, Vice President, All India Confederation of the Blind as well as Chair of its Advocacy Committee;
3. Ms. Sachu Ramalingam, Secretary, All India Confederation of the Blind and Chair of its Women’s Forum.
As a part of the programme of the workshop, three assignments were also given to the participants. These included:
a) Developing an advocacy strategy for ratification of UNCRPD in the countries where the same has not been ratified.
b) Developing a plan of action related to the implementation of Right to Education (article 24) of UNCRPD.
c) Preparing a detailed action plan relating to the implementation of Right to Work (article 27) of UNCRPD.
Conducted in an interactive manner, the workshop was very successful as could be seen from the enthusiastic and quality participation of all the delegates. In particular, the advocacy workshop was able to achieve the following ends:
1. The leadership of the blindness movement in 5 participating countries could be encouraged to take up a more proactive role by enhancing advocacy initiatives both on short term and long term issues concerning the blind and the low vision persons.
2. The advocacy skills and strategies adopted by the participating leaders could be strengthening through this workshop.
3. There was an urgent realization created among the leaders through this workshop for taking systematic and effective advocacy initiatives for ratification of UNCRPD in countries where it has not so far been ratified.
4. The participants could be equipped with knowledge and understanding of the available opportunities and strategies for ensuring implementation of UNCRPD as well as for participating in the submission of the Reports by the countries to the committee constituted for that purpose.
5. It provided a renewed vigour to the networking among member- organizations of different countries for sharing experiences on common issues for the benefit of each other.
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4. PRESSURE MOUNTS ON TAJIKISTAN GOVERNMENT
TO ADOPT UNCRPD
Among the Central Asian countries, while nations such as Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan have signed the UNCRPD and Turkmenistan has gone so far as to ratify the convention as well as signed the optional protocol, Tajikistan remains rather isolated having not even signed the convention. With a view to show the solidarity of the disability sector there and to press for the implementation of various articles of the convention, a two day workshop on UNCRPD was held by the Public Organization of Blind along with other organizations which are working in the disability sector there. The event was sponsored by Asian Blind Union.
A total of 48 participants including representatives from the Ministries of Justice, Education, Health and Labour and Social protection attended this event.
The seminar was inaugurated by Mr. Davlatov B.T., President of the Public Organization of Blind. It provided a useful opportunity to the visually impaired members of the organization to learn more about the various provisions of UNCRPD. It also provided a learning experience to the representatives of various government agencies as far as issues concerning disability in general and UNCRPD in particular.
An overview of the Convention was presented by Mr. Zikrikhudoev A. a representative of the National Association of people with disability. He regretted that Tajikistan had not yet taken any steps to sign the UNCRPD.
A notable presentation was made by Ms. Shamsidinova Fotima, a visually impaired 4th year student of Tajik National University, Law faculty and a member of Public Organization of Blind of Tajikistan in Dushanbe. In her presentation she pointed out the convergence between the rights based principles of the convention and the prevailing laws of Tajikistan. As there was no contradiction between the two, the Tajikistan Government should have no hesitation in accepting this Convention, she argued. However, Ms. Fotima also pointed out that the «law of social protection of people with disability» of Republic of Tajikistan passed in 1991 was not fully implemented. She as well as other speakers were of the view that persons with disability would greatly benefit if the present law on disability as well as UNCRPD were fully implemented.
To work towards this end, and to ensure the signing and ratification of UNCRPD by the Tajikistan Government, a working group comprising of the heads of four major DPOs of Tajikistan was formed. Making the visually impaired members of the Public Organization of Blind of Tajikistan more aware about their rights as per the UNCRPD, sensitizing representatives of various government and non-governmental agencies about issues concerning persons with disabilities and the efficacy of UNCRPD in their specific country context and bringing various disability organizations together in the formation of a pressure group to lobby with the Tajikistan government for signing and ratification of UNCRPD, were some of the important achievements of this initiative of Asian Blind Union.
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5. VISUALLY IMPAIRED CHILDREN WITH MENTAL RETARDATION RECEIVE ABU’S ATTENTION IN THE MIDDLE EAST:
It is a generally accepted fact that for a visually impaired child with mental retardation, the primary disability is the mental retardation and not so much his/her visual impairment. A child who is blind can learn the same things as other children learn by using some alternative techniques, such as Braille or typing. However, a child who is mentally retarded learns differently, that is, the child learns more slowly.
In the context of Middle East ABU member countries, While many school programs provide the specialized instructions needed by students who are visually impaired, there is much room for improvement.
When it comes to those visually impaired children who also suffer from mental retardation or intellectual disability, the scenario of support provided to them is all the worse. There is a severe shortage of specialists and qualified teachers of visually impaired students with mental retardation, which restricts access to the specialized skills these children need. This means that such students receive instructions from personnel who are not qualified to teach critical skills. This problem is even more alarming in rural communities, where shortages of qualified personnel are most acute.
Keeping in view this critical issue, Asian Blind Union, in collaboration with Friendship Association of the Blind, conducted a two day training workshop in Amman (Jordan) on 29-30 may, 2010. It was attended by 24 participants from 10 Middle East countries of which 13 were women.
- The two day training was conducted by Dr. Shaden Elewat, Consultant, and Higher Council for Persons with Disabilities, Consultant, Jordan German University and Consultant, International Handicapped as well as CBM who has a vast experience of working with blind and low vision persons. Dr. Suha Tabal, an expert on early intervention and multi-disability was the co-trainer. Topics such as Categories of Visual Impairment and Mental Retardation, Causes, Syndromes, Tests, Prevalence, Selection, Qualifications and Training of Trainers and Care givers, Strategies of Working with Individuals and Groups, Sensitizing and Involving Family Members, Importance of Planning, Preparing Programmes etc. Practical sessions were also conducted.
This initiative of Asian Blind Union has helped create capable human resource to handle a critical target group among visually impaired children in the Middle East countries, namely, visually impaired children with mental retardation.
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6. LEGAL LITERACY FOR VISUALLY IMPAIRED WOMEN:
AN IMPORTANT FOCUS OF ABU WOMEN’S COMMITTEE
In a series of legal literacy programmes for visually impaired women, which the Women’s Committee of Asian Blind Union has planned to conduct at the national levels, a two day legal literacy sensitization seminar was held in Nepal on 29-30 April, 2010. This event took place at the Women Development Training Centre, Jawalakhel, Lalitpur, Nepal and was organized by Nepal Association of the Blind with financial support from ABU.
The primary objective of the programme was to bring to light the specific issues of the Blind and partially sighted women of the country and to keep the leaders of the Districts well informed about existing laws and legislations including women related provisions. The workshop was attended by a total of 60 persons. These included: 32 leading visually impaired women from 22 district branches, 9 resource persons, 7 volunteers and NAB staff.
The major issues covered at the workshop included:
1. Convention on Elimination of Discrimination against women-CEDAW, Domestic violence with reference to women with particular relevance to the concerned legislation, UNCRPD and its implementation, Legislations for persons with disabilities in Nepal, Government services for PWDs in Nepal.
2. The presentations on the above topics were made by eminent resource persons. Ample time was provided to the participants for questions and discussions. As far as possible, copies of various presentations were made available to participants
in Braille and large print.
3. The outcome of the programme was that it provided the participants a welcome opportunity to deliberate upon their common problems with the leading visually impaired women coming together on a single platform. The seminar has helped create a strong and aware force of blind and low vision women to work for women empowerment throughout Nepal.
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7. ABU WOMEN’S COMMITTEE COMPLETES AN IMPORTANT RESEARCH STUDY PERTAINING TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND EMOTIONAL ABUSE AMONG WOMEN WITH VISUAL IMPAIRMENT
(Recently, an important research study which relates to prevalence, causes and impact of domestic violence and emotional abuse among women with visual impairment in the selected ABU member countries has been completed by the Women’s Committee, Asian Blind Union. In the following write-up, Ms. Madhu Singhal, Chair of this Committee explains the context, the objectives and salient findings of this study):
Domestic violence among women with visual impairment is undoubtedly a human rights issue and a serious deterrent to development. The phenomenon of domestic violence is widely prevalent but has remained largely invisible in the public domain.
Therefore, a need was felt to conduct a study to establish the prevalence of emotional abuse in women with visual impairment and to make suitable recommendations to the Governmental agencies in the Asian Blind Union region, based on which women with visual impairment could avail care and protection by the formulation of appropriate policies by the concerned governments to safeguard the interests and rights of such women. Each woman irrespective of the country, belongs to and irrespective of her being able or disabled has the right to safeguard her dignity which is her basic fundamental right as a citizen of any country. She has the right to seek supportive services, compensations and rehabilitative care under the mainstream women-related laws under the legislations dealing with persons with disabilities.
It was in this backdrop that the Women’s Committee of ABU decided to conduct this research study in five ABU countries: India and Nepal in South Asia, Jordan and Yemen in the Middle East and Tajikistan in Central Asia.
A questionnaire was prepared and it was decided to collect 40 samples from each of the 5 countries. The questionnaire was reviewed and translated in Russian and Arabic. In each of the five countries, investigators were appointed to collect the data.
Findings:
Overall Level of Abuse across Asia:
On calculating the mean scores across countries, the study found that in the Asian region, in general, (based on the 5 countries sampled), a large percentage of visually impaired women (60.2%) were undergoing moderate level of emotional abuse. Many suffer severe emotional abuse as well (27%).
Thus, the study supports the view that most of the visually impaired women undergo some kind of emotional abuse in their lives.
Based on the information collected during the interviews, it can be said that in most cases, the abusers are related to the victims. During the course of the interviews, it was also identified that lack of assertiveness had led to longer periods of emotional abuse. Their limited social interactions/relationship building with the outside world had prevented them from seeking help or even communicating the occurrence of the trauma to others. Their submissive behavior especially as seen in India led them to go through continued abuse by the abusers. Culturally having learned to suppress their feelings along with being visually impaired, they did not find an outlet to release the trauma experienced. The study found that these women were lacking in mental strength and self esteem. Somewhere they had accepted that since they were disabled they were burdens and did not have the right to be like other members of the society.
On comparing the degree of emotional abuse reported by participants across various countries, it was found that India was the only country where majority of the visually impaired women had reported the abuse to be severe (52%). This was followed by Jordan at 42.5%, Nepal at 25% and Tajikistan at 15% and Yemen at 0%.
In 4 countries (Jordan, Nepal, Tajikistan, Yemen) most participants reported the intensity to be moderate. 75% of participants from Yemen, followed by 67% from Nepal, 57.5% from Jordan, 57% from Tajikistan and 45% from India had reported experiencing moderate level of emotional abuse.
Based on the findings, some urgent and important recommendations have also been made in the study. It is recommended that further research be conducted in this area to explore, in depth, the causes of such a difference being reported across countries. This would assist in designing country or region-specific intervention modules.
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8. TECH TALK
Buddy Unlocks Doors of Daisy Books for Developing Countries
By Mr. Dipendra Minocha,
President, Daisy Forum of India
DAISY Books have changed the way persons with blindness listen to talking books. The DAISY Books provide many advantages over talking books in MP3 format or Talking Books on audio cassettes. These benefits include capability to jump to any page, chapter or subsection in a book. The user can move to previous or next sentence and get information about the book such as: how many pages are there in a book, how long the book is, what is the total time of recording of a book, etc. Most DAISY Players remember where you last left reading a book so that when you open the book the next time, it would start playing the book exactly from the position where you left reading it last time. Players can remember the last position for all books that you would have opened with this player. The compact size of the digital DAISY books makes it possible to carry a whole library of books in their pocket.
All these facilities were only a dream for persons living in developing countries because the cost of the DAISY book player was so high that just a handful of persons with blindness could purchase these players. Long time effort of producing a low cost DAISY Book player finally became successful with the launch of the Buddy DAISY Book player in India. With the support from DAISY Forum of India, Bisquare Systems – an Electronic Product Design Company recently released the buddy player. The cost of this player is just rupees 4,000 plus taxes in India and about 125 USD for countries outside India. Key features of this player are:
Compact size: The player is smaller than even a mobile phone and can easily fit into your pocket.
Memory: the player has 2 GB in internal memory and can support up to 16 GB SD card. Thus, you can carry as many books as you want in your pocket.
Long battery life: The player has mobile type of chargeable battery which lasts 15 hours on full charge.
Fully Accessible: All menus and settings are self voicing and all features of the player can be used by persons with blindness very easily.
Audio Recording: The Buddy player has special modes for short recordings (Voice Notes) and long recordings. This feature makes it very convenient to use the buddy for class room lecture recording and equally useful for short audio memo recording for noting down phone numbers etc.
Music: The Buddy has excellent music player with SRS Audio comparable with best of digital music players. The player also has FM radio with auto channel search facilities.
For more details about the DAISY Books, you can visit http://www.daisy.org.
For more details on the Buddy Player, you can contact
Bisquare Systems Pvt. Ltd.
http://www.bisquare.com
E-mail: buddy@bisquare.com
Tel: +91-120-433-0211
or
Saksham Trust:
http://www.saksham.org
E-mail: info@saksham.org
tel: +91-11-4241-1015
Ready to use Computers for the Blind:
Computers are a revolutionary tool for persons with blindness or low vision. A computer can remove most of the limitations of reading and writing for them. Reading of newspapers, books, magazines, dictionaries, encyclopedia, reading and writing of letters, writing examinations and assignments, maintaining of address book, maintaining bank accounts, online shopping, share trading, writing your own cheques, etc are some of the tasks that persons with blindness can do themselves if they have their own computer loaded with screen reading software and related utilities. Best part is that most of this software is available in open source or freeware domains. The problem is that only the costly commercial software attracts marketing people and most people do not even know about the power of free of cost software solutions. Saksham trust and Intel took up Samarth Project where volunteers from both these organizations put together a suite of such important tools.
Saksham Trust configured Samsung N150 Netbook with this software and what came out was an amazing fully configured computer at lowest possible cost for this revolutionary tool. In the month of April 2010 100 such fully configured computers were made available to University Students at the cost of 11500 Indian Rupees. This included a subsidy of 5000 rupees from IFCI on each computer. These computers are still available without the subsidy at the cost of 15500 rupees. The Samarth project will also be happy to share the suite of free of cost software with any organization who would like to offer these services to persons with blindness or low vision.
The capabilities of this specially configured machine have potential of changing the life of persons with blindness completely and provide them capabilities that can open many doors of employment for them.
Samsung N150 computer has hardware configuration of 160 GB hard-disc, one GB RAM, comfortable keyboard, USB and Bluetooth connectivity, Wireless and cable LAN, connectivity to external monitor, 10 inch built in screen and also a web cam and a card reader. Most advantageous features of this machine are its 7 hours of battery life and just 1.2 KG weight. Features that got added to this machine with Samarth Suite of software are:
Multi lingual Screen Reading software, DAISY Book Player, word-processing, spreadsheet, e-mail, internet browser, dictionary, newspaper reading, easy access to thousand of books from bookshare and Gutenberg online libraries, audio recording, music playback, etc.
This solution is no less than a dream machine for persons with blindness. The Samarth suite of software can be loaded on any computer and is not dependent on any single type of brand of computer. In just about 350 USD and some training a person with blindness can have the whole wealth of information, knowledge and communication at their fingertips.
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9. INSPIRATION
(The following success story of Mr. K. Ramkrishna was originally published in a book titled Abilities Redefined: Forty Stories of Courage and Accomplishment, Brought out by All India Confederation of the Blind in 2005. The story was written by Ms. Priya Vardan. The recent updates to the original story have been provided by Mr. Ramkrishna himself).
Passion & Patience - K. Ramkrishna
One cannot but be wonder-struck on hearing K. Ramkrishna, a visually impaired professional, solve algebraic equations and calculus problems orally in seconds! So much so that even a die-hard mathematics-detractor might start taking a fancy for the subject! How does he do it? One might ask. He simply says, “Think systematically and systematically, go step-by-step like a computer program and the solution will be in front of you.” He goes on to add, “Whether it is problem at home or office, I concentrate on identifying and tackling the factors that initiated the problem and not just the problem alone.” This has given him considerable ease, control and confidence on his work. Very recently he retired from the Risk Department of IDBI Bank Ltd., as General Manager.
K. Ramkrishna was born in Trichy, Tamil Nadu, on January 7, 1950 and was brought up in the city of Mumbai. He was born with congenital cataract. He continued with his life normally since his vision in both eyes was somewhat okay. At the age of 11 however, he developed glaucoma and lost vision in his left eye. Subsequently, he developed retinal detachment in the right eye at the age of 13. His vision started deteriorating gradually; he stopped attending school and lost five years of academic studies. By the age of 22, he had become totally blind.
Right from childhood, he had a passion for mathematics. In his words “At school, maths was the only subject in which I did well.” It was a passion that proved to be his pillar of strength and, along with his photographic memory saw him overcome obstacles resulting from his blindness and realize his dreams. He believed in being different by doing things differently rather than doing different things. He always wanted to stand out in a crowd and did everything possible to be so.
His family had very little awareness about disability matters and so could not offer much support to him, but they certainly never discouraged him either. He recalls, “My family thought my blindness was a matter of destiny.” Their awareness about the disability and its rehabilitation was self-initiated, helped by the advice of friends and a few experts in the disability sector. So, he rejoined school at the age of 18 in Std. IX, with the encouragement, guidance and support of Mrs. Rehmut Fazelbhoy, a well-known philanthropist in the blind welfare field and from Padma Shree Dr. Rajendra T. Vyas, Honorary Secretary General of the National Association for the Blind, India – NAB (India). He enjoyed an unceasing excellent academic and professional career. Since he was very good in Mathematics he could help his friends in the subject and in return they helped him in his academics by being his readers and writers. Thus the support he received was not a one-way traffic.
After completing his Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Economics and Statistics and Master’s in Economics (with Mathematical Economics and Econometrics as special subjects) from the University of Bombay at the age of 26, he worked in an electronics firm for five years. But the pull of the academic world proved too strong for him; he wanted to realize a dream that had been etched in his mind for a long time. He explains, “Long ago, a friend had wanted me to do an MBA (Master of Business Administration) degree. But at that point of time, neither my friend nor I knew what an MBA was. And that thought lingered as a dream and passion.”
He applied for Master of Management Studies. The selection process included an entrance exam, a group discussion, a personality test and an interview. When he approached the university authorities with a request to provide him with a writer for the entrance exam, the authorities seriously thought “I had gone mad”, says Ramkrishna. Their contention was: How could a blind person even think of making such an attempt to participate in a predominantly quantitative and speed-oriented Management Entrance Test, leave alone succeeding in gaining entry to the course. But they could not refuse him from sitting for the entrance exam -- and he performed exceedingly well. While MBA was his passion, he realized he has to be patient in letting people be convinced about his ability.
He joined the SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai, and specialized in Finance. He made use of his excellent communicational and quantitative skills to complete the professional managerial post-graduate degree in finance and that too from one of the top then business schools of India.
During the campus interviews he was offered jobs by several institutions; he chose IDBI Ltd. In his words, “I consciously joined IDBI Ltd. which gave me the initial start and has recognized my ability by posting me to key operating departments. IDBI’s attitude was positive and mutually beneficial.”
With infrastructure support in place, he had no problems in carrying out his responsibilities. He emphasized on being evaluated on par with other employees of the organization. He realized that he had to make double the efforts to produce quality and error free output in the organization which would help him to manage the corporate competition successfully. He states “If an error is committed by anyone with disability, that error will be related immediately to his or her handicap, whether or not it is true. So I had to put in double the efforts to ensure that my output is error-free.”
Despite an error-free performance, there was curiosity, even skepticism, about how he functioned. At a meeting, someone asked about how to deal with a visually impaired person in the organization. A fitting reply was given to that by the then Chairman, Late S. S. Nadkarni: “Who is that visually impaired person?” Mr. Nadkarni categorically stated: “In a place of work or, for that matter, in carrying out his responsibilities or participating in any team to achieve results, none of us feels that Mr. Ramkrishna has vision impairment.”
The two important pillars of Mr. Ramkrishna’s success have been his mathematical ability and use of technology. The latter includes screen reading software, talking devices, OCR and scanning software, electronic diary etc. His job profile in IDBI Bank included commercial appraisal of industrial projects, assessing the viability of projects from the standpoints of global competitiveness, marketing strategies, technology, cost structure and much more.
Besides his job, he also finds time for voluntary work. He is the Acting Honorary Secretary General of NAB (India) and is leading the organization towards effective service delivery to the blind, financial resilience and organizational excellence. He is also deeply involved in teaching and cultural activities. He is presently an adjunct professor with the SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, lecturing on subjects like project finance, risk management, derivatives and advanced financial management etc. He is a performing artist in devotional music in many languages and has been conducting programs in India and abroad.
Whether it’s mathematics, music or his profession, Mr. Ramkrishna does everything to perfection. His excellence has fetched him awards from several organizations, e.g. the All India Confederation of the Blind, National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People, JAYCEE, NAB, Lions Club etc. Doordarshan (India’s public broadcaster television) had made a two-part program titled ‘Strivers and Achievers’ on his life and achievements.
Having traveled abroad and also having been exposed to the disability sector in India, he has an interesting comment to make: “They (developed countries) have the infrastructure, accessibility, social security net etc., but despite all that I believe not many disabled people are part of the mainstream there.”
With regard to India, Mr. Ramkrishna affirms that disabled people should be prepared for new sets of challenges and that they should be made to think differently about their disability. He stresses the need to have new and innovative training methods coupled with massive awareness campaigns from school level onwards, to change the scenario. In his inspiring words: “There is no one in the world who is not disabled and, in fact, all of us are differently-abled. There is no need to be defensive and submissive about your disability. After all, you are differently-abled. Have confidence in yourself. You will be what you want to be. You will get what you deserve: nothing less, nothing more”.
Mr. K. Ramkrishna is, indeed, ‘The Master-Challenger’ amongst the visually challenged persons in India.