KARACHI, May 14: Will technology be ever able to assist people with physical disabilities, especially those who are either born blind or have lost their eyesight accidentally? This is one of the questions that pops-up in many minds considering the fact that there are approximately 1.5 million (according to National Blindness Survey carried out in 2004) visually impaired people in Pakistan and, according to an estimate, 57 per cent of them cannot be treated.
Though it might sound somewhat an exaggerated account, there are certain people with such disabilities in the world who work just as any other fellow workers on computers in their respective organisations. How? The answer to this is software, a product of NanoPac, – Job Access with Speed (Jaws) – and some equipment that convert data into a format called Digital Accessible Information System (Daisy).
The ‘Jaws’ is a software that works for individuals and organisations and the ‘Daisy’ is a system that is purely meant for institutes that produce talking books, websites, periodicals, etc for blinds. To make it easy, when the book has been converted in the format, it can be read out to vision impaired person through a talking book reader. Daisy was established in Switzerland. Basically, a consortium of 65 countries, including Pakistan, it works for the conversion of data and its storage. In fact, Daisy for All Pakistan Forum was established in the country with the help of District 3270, Committee for Technology and Vocational Education and other organisations. There are five institutes in Pakistan that have trained people and are working on Daisy.
Pakistan is one of the developing countries and has one of the major chunks of the vision impaired people in the world, but why is it that these softwares are not encouraged and promoted even by the companies that create them. Probably one of the reasons might be the product cost which on the internet is quoted at $895 for the one compatible with Windows XP Home and $1,095 for the one that is well-suited for Windows XP Professional, Home, and Media Centre Editions/2000/ME/98.
Despite all the teething troubles, Saira Saleem, a teacher at the Special Education Department, University of Karachi, herself a vision impaired, works on and operates computer without any difficulty at all. Jaws helps her communicate to PC and tell her what she is typing and reading.
Ms Saleem, who has done a diploma course in computer skills, needs no one to assist her. She writes her thesis, types her papers, uses various programmes, browses the internet and read her emails on a daily basis. What she thinks needs improvement is that Jaws is unable to describe and explain pictures and photos on display in any form. However, as the cliché goes “where there is a will there is a way,” pirated and copied versions of the software are available. Neither there is much awareness about it in the masses, nor is it easily available. There are probably one or more shops in the city that have the software and only those who have bought it from there or have it copied from someone know about it.
There is one drawback, however, for those who opt for the pirated/copied version and that is it runs smoothly for 30 to 40 minutes only. One has to restart the computer in order to keep using the software. Another disappointing feature about this is that certain features of the programme are lost every time the PC is turned on to reuse the system.
According to Syed Azhar Rizvi, a member of the Central Executive Committee of the Pakistan Software Houses Association (Pasha), “In the United States, it is considered mandatory for academic books to be available in a format that is accessible to students with visual disability.”
It is worth pondering what the government has done in this regard? Why such softwares and means are kept out of the reach of those who despite their physical hindrance want to prove their metal to the world? Furthermore, what are the IT gurus of the country doing about it? It seems that it is after all the world where money can buy many things if not everything. Hopefully, however, future is not so bleak and people like Saima Saleem will continue to break the stereotypes.
