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Friday, July 17, 2009

A Brilliant Business Idea Or An Anachronism?

This is apropos of the survey posted earlier.

Esha appears to be a non-profit venture, which seeks to assist organisations that conduct business with, educate or employ blind people. It can help to get visiting cards braille-enabled, conduct theatre workshops to sensitise people to the special needs of the visually impaired and help with the creation of environments that can be inclusive enough for them. It also has a blog focussed on related issues.

However, the idea appears to be somewhat before its time, since, as far as I know, not many businesses in India employ or even seek to employ the blind at present. I am not aware of many blind entrepreneurs who deal with large business houses either.

As far as educational institutions are concerned, I believe the blind generally have to seek admission to special schools and colleges in this country, where there hardly are any sighted pupils.

So, unless Esha can convince corporate India to invest heavily in the creation of employment opportunities for the blind or regular educational institutions to admit blind students, the only sightless beneficiaries of its efforts seem likely to be those on its own payroll, who, obviously, are not going to be more than a few.

Saturday, July 11, 2009

When India 'Exported Terror'

"Indira Gandhi's government provided us with arms training in Tamil Nadu's Salem district..."
- Karuna Amman alias Col. Karuna, formerly a close associate of LTTE chief Velupillai Prabhakaran and now a minister in the Government of Sri Lanka, in an interview published in The Week (issue dated July 5, 2009)

Update:
"India helped the Liberation Tigers at a particular historical time to train and arm our fighters..."
- Anton Balasingham, Chief Negotiator and idealogue of LTTE, in an exclusive interview to NDTV
"The intelligence agencies said, Don't worry about the LTTE, they are our boys, they will not fight us...They said these are boys who were trained by us from 1977..."
- J N Dixit, India's high commissioner to Sri Lanka from 1985 to 1989, in an interview published at Rediff.Com

Wednesday, July 08, 2009

A Survey

Ki-Jaana-Main-Kaun is carrying out a survey and has asked for assistance. Please answer the following questions:

In India, is it possible to get Braille on your visiting cards? Yes/No
Do you know of an organisation called Esha – People for the blind? Yes/No

Please post your answers in the comments section.
 
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