Keep an eye on these apps

PRASHANT AGRAWAL lists innovative apps that are providing a helping hand to the visually impaired people

Traditional education methods are now becoming off the league with changing scenarios due to COVID-19. Online education is now the new normal for every single student with COVID-19 creating havoc and disrupting the usual patterns of education. Considering this new normal, various policies and changes have been initiated even by the Government to incorporate skill education and easy entry and exit points in the education system. However, digital infrastructure that prevails already has not been utilised for the betterment of the careers of those who are physically impaired or differently abled. EdTech is the new systemised education platform which can be developed and utilised for not just those from the mainstream but also those who are differently abled. It has been fruitful especially for those who are visually impaired.

 WHO indicated that the globally visually impaired is estimated to be 285 million, out of which 39 million are sightless. Aatmanirbhar Bharat has been another extension of liberalising the visually impaired under which various schemes and innovations have come into being. These have been either in the form of applications or technologies that have been utilised for enriching the experience of the differently abled towards being educated. Some innovations listed have been helping those who are visually impaired successfully.

• Roshni, an app developed by students of IIM, helps the visually impaired recognise old and new currency notes, using image processing and analytics.
• JAWS is a computer screen reader programme for Microsoft Windows that allows blind and visually impaired users to read the screen either with a text-to-speech output or by a refreshable Braille display.
• The eye in AI is an app to help people who are visually impaired or with low vision
• Electric vehicles. Some manufacturers are already incorporating artificial noise into their electric vehicles.
• Be My Eyes is a free app that connects blind and low vision people with sighted volunteers and company representatives for visual assistance through alive video call
• Smart Glasses working on the development of a set of smart glasses that can use AI to read, provide navigation information and potentially identify faces. Glasses are connected to a smartphone through a processing unit, without an internet connection and allows it to function.
• Braille: This has been used for decades as a tactile way of reading with fingertips. It has now jumped from the page to the screen with the updated version of Narrator, the screen-reader for Microsoft Windows, supporting digital Braille displays and keyboards and many more.

The writer is the president of Narayan Seva Sansthan, a non-profit organisation serving differently able and underprivileged individuals