Centre for Internet and Society

The Right to Read Campaign, now in Delhi

praskrishna — 2011-08-17T08:45:56Z

The Right to Read campaign, this time in Delhi, the national capital of the country has been announced. This is the third in the series. The previous two held in Calcutta and Chennai were highly successful and Delhi too promises quite a lot.

About 70 million Indians are unable to read printed material owing to various forms of disabilities. According to industry estimates, around 80,000-100,000 books get published every year in India of which only about 700 are made available for these persons. Technologies like screen readers make it possible for persons with disabilities to access knowledge in alternate formats like Braille, e-text, audio, large print, et cetera. Yet people are unable to convert books into accessible formats thanks to the provisions of the Indian Copyright Act, 1957.

India needs to change the situation quickly and put an end to the shortage of books and enable these 70 million persons to participate in social life. For this we need to make use of the developments in technology which makes it possible for all persons to access knowledge and enable them to live a life of social inclusion and participation on par with the rest of society. People with disabilities too have a right to access information like other persons- let copyright laws recognize the diverse needs of persons with disabilities and open up the gates of knowledge to all.

Objectives of the Right to Read Campaign

To expedite copyright law reform by informing policy makers on the necessity and nature of amendment. This has to be made to the Indian Copyright Act 1957 to give effect to the rights of persons with disabilities.
To raise awareness on the issue amongst the parliamentarians, members of the judiciary, educationalists, publishers and the public.

The Campaign

The Indian campaign is a part of the global Right to Read campaign which was started by the World Blind Union in 2008. It is a nationwide campaign and seeks to:

Accelerate change in the copyright law;
Raise public awareness on the issue of access to reading for the print-impaired; and
Gather Indian support for the Treaty for the Blind proposed by the World Blind Union at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/right-to-read-campaign

Right to Read, Now in Mumbai

praskrishna — 2011-08-17T08:46:02Z

The third phase of the 'Right to Read' campaign in India held in Mumbai was coordinated by the Xavier’s Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC). The Mumbai Phase of the Right to Read Campaign was launched on 1st January 2010 and ran till the 27th of January 2010.

India has over 70 million persons who are unable to read printed materials and published information due to some forms of physical, cognitive or sensory disabilities. This includes the blind, visually impaired, persons with learning disabilities such as dyslexia and persons who are unable to use their hands or the upper part of their body and hence, cannot hold books. For these persons, information has to be converted into formats such as Braille, large print, audio, electronic and other formats which they can access using assistive technologies.

The ‘Right to Read' campaign was started for such persons. The campaign is part of a global initiative by the World Blind Union (WBU), Sightsavers International (SSI) and other such organizations. In India it is being spearheaded by the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Daisy Forum of India (DFI), Inclusive Planet and Xavier's Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC).

The campaign seeks to accelerate changes in copyright law, raise public awareness on the issue of access to reading for the print-impaired and gather Indian support for the Treaty for the Blind proposed by the World Blind Union at the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). The XRCVC as part of its work in the field of creating an accessible and inclusive society and promoting print access has campaigned for this cause mainly in Mumbai and Western India. This report focuses on the genesis and outcome of the Mumbai chapter of the global Right to Read campaign.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/mumbai-phase-of-right-to-read-campaign

Web Accessibility as a Government Mandate?

praskrishna — 2011-08-17T08:46:13Z

Is Web accessibility just a Government Mandate? Should private sites be ignored? Wesolowski examines this in light of the steps taken by ictQATAR to make its website accessible to W3C standards, and hopes that Qatar and eventually all other Arab nations will follow suit and make Web accessibility much more of a mandate.

Most web developers know that they should make their websites accessible to persons with disabilities, such as including captions for videos to assist the hearing impaired, designing navigation so it can be done through a keypad as opposed to a mouse and including descriptive captions for the blind. But too often developers choose fancy design over accessibility. In some countries though, accessibility is no longer an option!

In a recent white paper published by my friends at G3ict (thank you again for taking me to see the Center for the Visually Impaired when I was in Atlanta last June – inspiring!), web accessibility is examined from a policy perspective. The white paper’s editor, Nimita Narasimhan from The Center for Internet and Society in Bangalore, India, examines web accessibility policies in 15 countries and the EU in terms of scope of policies and the type of policy. Scope refers to how comprehensive a policy. Type refers to the level of enforcement in place for the policy, ranging from being only suggested guidelines to legislative mandates.

Not surprisingly, few countries currently have a high scope and high policy enforcement level (see chart below), but more and more countries are adopting guidelines and are trending towards real enforcement. The white paper notes that W3C has already developed comprehensive guidelines for countries to use, but that in countries that do not use a Latin-based language, such as here in the Gulf, the guidelines often need to be customized to fit specific online language needs.

I found it interesting how so many countries are adopting Web accessibility standards, but also how rarely they seem to have any legislative mandate behind them. In many of the countries that do have a legislative mandate, web accessibility is often tied to a broader piece of legislation dealing with persons with disabilities in general. May be this is the way for more countries to go. I also found it interesting how most legislation makes Web accessibility mandatory only for government sites, but ignores any private sites – this seems to me to very much limit the impact.

In Qatar, we are still at the early stages. ictQATAR has made its website accessible to W3C standards and has encouraged other government agencies and organizations to follow suit. This is clearly just a first step and hopefully Qatar and other Arab countries will start to make web accessibility much more of a mandate.

For original article on Digital Qatar

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/web-accessibility-government-mandate

Copyright Law as a tool for Inclusion

Rahul Cherian — 2013-02-20T11:04:40Z

Can Copyright Law be used as a tool for Inclusion? Rahul Cherian examines this in his blog on copyright.

Content owners have argued for years that copyright is a simple mechanism for the protection of author’s rights and the ownership of their creations. Globally, copyright law has been used as a tool to protect and enforce the rights of authors, publishers, record producers, software companies and movie moghuls. Copyright law has largely been responsible for creating virtual monopolies. But copyright law plays another role as important as protecting the rights of content owners, that of benefiting the world at large. In this context it is relevant to ask the question: Can Copyright Law be used as a tool for Inclusion?

Historically copyright was protected to afford greater encouragement to the production of literary works of lasting benefit to the world. One of the objectives of the first codified copyright law was to prevent publishers from having perpetual monopoly over works. Therefore copyright was available only for a short period of time after which the works were open to all to use. Thus, ideas of copyright law to balance the interests of the users and the authors began to take shape and moved away from being solely concerned with granting rights to publishers. The system of copyright was not an arrangement solely to safeguard the interests of the publishers but was an arrangement to balance interests of all the parties involved in order to espouse the greater cause of “encouragement of learning”. However, as copyright law evolved and vested interests started playing a larger role in shaping copyright law the goal of promoting scholarship and the “progress of science and useful arts” was lost. The period for which copyright is protected has been extended over the years. At present copyright in a literary work is protected for life of the author plus 60 years.

One of the communities that is hit hardest because copyright law focuses solely on the interest of publishers are persons with print impairment. Persons with print impairment, who may number close to 500 million globally, such as the visually impaired, dyslexics and persons with cerebral palsy, cannot read printed material. Publishers do not sell books in formats such as Braille, audio or e-text that can be “read” by persons with print impairment. Copyright law in most countries including India does not permit persons with print impairment to convert books into such formats as a result of which they are excluded from the education system (due to lack of text books), from working (due to lack of books for reference and research) and from leisure reading.

But all this is set to change. Over the last few years the World Blind Union, which represents more than 300 million persons with visual impairment, has been working on a draft treaty to allow for the conversion and distribution of books in accessible formats for persons with print impairment without infringing copyright. This draft treaty is currently being discussed at the World Intellectual Property Organisation and should hopefully be signed within the next few years. The Treaty, if signed, would be groundbreaking in the sense that it would be first time that international consensus will be reached on using copyright law as a tool for inclusion. As one of the people who was part of the treaty drafting exercise I find the resistance from most publishers to any expansion of the concept of “fair use” for persons with disabilities disturbing to say the least. This resistance is prevalent at the international level for the Treaty as well at the national level here in India where we have been working with disability rights organisations and policy research partners on amending Indian copyright law to achieve the same objectives (www.righttoread.in <http://www.righttoread.in/>). The common refrain of publishers is that any such change would result in piracy, almost as if blind people are the sole perpetrators of copyright infringement. The unsaid reason for the resistance is obvious: publishers do not want any expansion of the concept of “fair use”, even when they will not suffer any monetary loss. Publishers are concerned that the proposed expansion of “fair use” for the benefit of persons with print impairment could open the floodgates for further “fair use” exceptions for, say, education. So they resist this change, which will benefit hundreds of millions of persons with print disability around the world by enabling them to exercise their basic fundamental rights to read, to learn and to work.

What is encouraging though is that some momentum has built up at the national and international level on this issue with several countries supporting the Treaty. At the national level in India, the Ministry of Human Resource Development has proposed some appalling wording for the copyright amendment. But it is heartening to note that several leading politicians including India’s Law Minister has written to the Minister of Human Resource Development to re-look at the amendment. We are working at the Parliamentary level to try and ensure that the amendment is modified to meet the requirements of persons with print impairments. Over the next few months and years we will see how this plays out. We are quietly optimistic as always.

It is indeed heartening to note that there is a serious attempt to strike a balance between the interests of copyright owners and the public at large. Copyright law should be used as a tool to foster development and inclusion and should not perpetuate monopolies and exclusion. The exceptions to copyright for the benefit of persons with print impairment are a good starting point for using copyright law for one of its original purposes. In the long term I believe that these exceptions will create newer markets for publishers as a result of more print impaired persons becoming educated and having an income to BUY books in formats that they can read. After all, who will want to take the effort to convert a book into an accessible when they can buy the accessible version?

For those of you who are not convinced about the requirement of any change in the copyright landscape, let me pose these questions: should the right of a blind person to read a book be subservient to the copyright of a publisher or author? If a publisher refuses to sell a book in an accessible format, does the blind person have the right to convert the book into an accessible format? What if the book were needed for her education?

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/copyright-law-as-tool-for-inclusion

e-Accessibility: A Wiki Project

rebecca — 2011-08-23T04:51:08Z

Envisaged and funded by the National Internet Exchange of India, and executed by the Centre for Internet and Society, a Wiki site pertaining to issues of disability and e-accessibility has recently been launched.

Such a project is most timely as India has a large percentage of disabled persons in its population— estimated to be over seven per cent as per the Census of 2001. Taken in figures, this amounts to roughly 70-100 million persons with disabilities in the territory of India. Out of this number, a mere two per cent of persons with disabilities residing in urban areas have access to information and assistive technologies.

Regrettably, there still remains a lack of awareness on how information and services can be best delivered to persons with disabilities. Parents, teachers, government authorities and society at large remain equally unaware of the options technology today presents to enable persons with disabilities live independent and productive lives. Therefore, the wiki aims foremost to serve as a resource for persons with disabilities and their families, NGO’s, as well as the members of education and legal communities--providing valuable information surrounding disability and electronic accessibility.

Covered in 125 article wiki project includes a broad collection of articles pertaining to topics of accessibility for users, developers, organizations, developments in India, and accessibility for nations. With hopes of expansion, wikipage can be accessed and edited collaboratively at http://accessibility.cis-india.org.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/e-accessibility-a-wiki-project

Meeting on National Policy for e-Access for All

nirmita — 2011-08-26T05:13:44Z

The world over, there is a move towards making the internet more accessible for persons with visual and print disabilities and for elderly persons. Many countries like the USA and UK have adopted legislation to make adherence to web accessibility standards mandatory. In India we are still relatively unaware of the importance of web accessibility. On Nov 7, 2008 at 11:00 am, the Centre for Internet and Society will host a meeting at the CIS office to discuss strategies and a plan of action to launch a campaign for making web content accessibility standards mandatory in India.

The internet has has breathed fresh life and energy into the situations of disabled persons throughout the world. It has enabled and liberated them in the most complete sense of the word and succeeded in elevating levels of independence, competence and confidence. Like any other technology however this comes with its share of problems, related to accessibility. Thankfully, many of these problems can be solved by merely setting some minimum standards in place at no extra cost or effort.

For any technology to be completely useful, it has to meet the criteria of utility, usability, affordability, acceptance and accessibility. Unfortunately, while the internet can surmount most of obstacles that are faced by disabled persons in relation to access to information, navigation or comprehension problems are equally severe barriers to visually and print disabled persons effectively using it. To help better understand the issue, explained below are some features which are quite problematic for persons with visual and reading disabilities. They are accompanied by some simple solutions which can be easily incorporated by web page creators.

Web pages often contain images and graphics which cannot be discerned by screen readers; text descriptions and explanations can be provided for these. Creation of links to skip to content can provide a huge relief for persons using screen readers, instead of them having to listen to unrelated or confusing content. There should be keyboard alternatives for every function that has to be executed with a mouse. Links without references such as “click here” or links without any specific destination should be avoided. Creators of web pages should not rely upon colours to convey meanings. Finally, since screen readers read content as it is in the code, web page creators should ensure that content is read correctly on the page as well as in the code.

Adherence to web accessibility standards can help avoid these problems. Countries like the USA, UK, Canada, and Australia have enacted legislations to make it mandatory for creators of web pages to follow their minimum standards for web page accessibility. India has ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in October 2007. Unfortunately however, no move, has been made till date to adopt web accessibility guidelines or make such guidelines mandatory in our country. Consequently, a lot of government and private web sites are inaccessible for persons with disabilities, defeating the very purpose of ICT for development.

Considering these factors, we think it is time we make a concerted effort towards enabling a more inclusive online environment for all. Adopting a web accessibility standard does not merely make the web more accessible to disabled persons, it makes navigation and operation easier for everyone. The W3C has come out with a web accessibility standard called the WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) which has been adopted by many countries. This makes the tasks of the countries easier in the sense that they already have a ready framework and guidelines available to work with.

We solicit your active support and presence in this movement for enabling mandatory adherence to web accessibility standards in India. You are invited to join the Google group for a national policy for e-Access (http://groups.google.com/group/e-access). We are planning to have a meeting of all interested parties and organizations who are committed to supporting this cause on the date and venue given below. We request you to attend along with other supporters.

Meeting Details

Date: 7th Nov, 2008 (Friday)
Time: 11:00 am
Venue:
Centre for Internet and Society
No. D2, 3rd Floor, Shariff Chambers
14 Cunningham Road,
Bangalore - 560 052

Map: http://bit.ly/cis-map
Phone: +91 80 4092 6283

Please communicate your participation to us, by sending an email to
nirmita AT cis-india DOT org
M: +91 9845868078

Download meeting agenda

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/meeting-on-national-policy-for-e-access-for-all

First Meeting on a National Policy for Web Accessibility

nirmita — 2011-08-25T08:38:03Z

The first meeting to discuss having a national policy for web accessibility to ensure universal and inclusive participation was held at the Centre for Internet and Society's office on 7 November 2008. It was aimed at formulating an action plan to work with the government and other private and public bodies to ensure conformity to accessibility standards for web sites.

The first meeting to discuss making compliance with web accessibility standards a part of the national policy agenda was held today (7 November 2008) at the CIS office. Fifteen participants representing organizations from the disability sector, media and law firms came together to discuss the why, what and how of mandatory compliance with web accessibility standards for Indian government web sites.

The meeting started off with brief introductions of the participants, followed by a presentation by Rahul Gonsalves introducing the concept of and need for web accessibility standards amongst web developers. In his presentation, Rahul gave some examples of the kinds of problems faced by different users of the net and simple solutions to solve these problems. Speaking from the perspective of a web designer, he pointed out that while the total cost of creating an accessible web site is merely about 2-3% more than a normal web site, revamping an existing web site to make it conform to accessibility standards is a more complicated and expensive task. He further clarified that for a website to be accessible, it is not merely enough that it is created in accordance with accessibility standards; all future additions and modifications must be made with accessibility in mind. Hence, persons working on the web site should be initiated into creating accessible web pages.

The second presentation of the day was by Jayna Kothari of Ashira Law Services. Jayna, a lawyer who is well known for taking up disability related cases in Bangalore, talked about the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act 1995 (PWD Act) and highlighted provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities which came into force in May 2008. She began by talking about the right to access information being a fundamental right guaranteed by Article 19 of our constitution and gave references to various sections in the PWD Act. The Act calls for the setting up of Central and State Co-ordination Committees to ensure that action is taken to give effect to the provisions of the PWD Act and that an accessible, barrier free and inclusive environment is created for persons with disabilities in all spheres such as health, education, employment, transportation, etc. Jayna also highlighted that article 9 of the UNCRPD called for persons with disabilities to have an equal right to access to information and communication. Hence the mandate was not restricted to government web sites only. She opined that we could potentially work with the State and Central Co-ordination Committees to include web accessibility on their agenda of urgent requirements.

Mr Ganesh of Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled talked about intervention at the level of educational organizations and training institutes. He said that instead of merely discussing strategies which are designed to target the Government and get its attention, we also need to work on building awareness amongst the coming generation of web site developers and appeal to schools, training institutes like the NIIT and other educational organizations and centres of learning to disseminate awareness about accessibility right from the beginning. The approach, in other words, has to be both top-down and bottom-up. Ushajee Peri from the Alternative Law Forum (ALF) talked briefly about the Right to Information Act (2005) and said that since the right to information is a fundamental right, we need to carefully analyse provisions of the Act under which we could push for web accessibility.

Mr. L. Subramani from the Deccan Herald talked in brief about media strategy and about how publications could help in creating awareness and pressure. Finally, Meenu Bambani from MPhasiS talked about the 11th Five Year Plan and cited various provisions from it which called for specific measures for disabled persons. After an entire chapter devoted to disability, nothing has as yet been achieved in the year since the plan came into force, even though India has ratified the UNCRPD. Meenu called for immediate action to push the Government for implementation of the chapter on disability in the 11th Five Year Plan. As per the plan, each Government department was to allocate 3% of its funds for supporting disabled persons; this has not been done so far. Meenu believes that 3 December, which is usually celebrated as the World Disabilities Day, should this year be spent in introspection on what we have not achieved and on how we can push the state and government authorities to take their international and national commitments with respect to disabled persons seriously.

There was also a brief discussion on how laws in different countries accommodated web accessibility. For instance in the USA, Section 508 requires web sites of all federal agencies to comply with web accessibility guidelines. In the UK, the Code of Conduct which was brought out by the Disabilities Rights Commission (DRC) under the Disabilities Discrimination Act 2002 (DDA) mandates that persons with disabilities should have the right to access goods, services, facilities and premises on an equal basis as others. Section 2.14 lists the different kinds of services and 2.17 specifically says that a website is a provision of service and hence should be accessible. PAS 78 lays down guidelines for web developers for creating accessible web sites. While some participants expressed curiosity about the actual number of disabled persons using the internet in India, it was generally understood that only by making web sites more accessible could we widen the net of disabled users and enhance universal access and participation.

Another area for intervention was presented by Sunil Abraham in the form of a discussion on the national policy for Open Standards. Sunil said that CIS had given an addendum to the response to the draft national policy on open standards which specifically dealt with web accessibility for disabled and elderly persons. By ensuring that WCAG compliance is inserted in the presentation layer of the Government Interoperability Framework (GIF), which the Government is shortly expected to release, we could make a definite and substantial intervention.

The final conclusions of the meeting were that there were different areas and scopes for intervention and they all had to be simultaneously pursued by different groups. Everyone agreed that we should try and work with the National Informatics Centre (NIC) to make all government web sites accessible. Almost all participants felt that while it was not possible to impose web accessibility standards on private entities, we need not restrict ourselves to government web sites in our recommendations and should include at least public listed companies as well. Mr. Subramani felt that working with NASSCOM might be useful for that. Finally it was also decided that an appeal for web accessibility would be put out by CIS at the Walkathon to be organized by Samarthanam on 6 December, since it would be a good platform for spreading awareness and gaining support amongst disabled users, public authorities, organizations and the public at large.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/first-meeting-on-a-national-policy-for-web-access-for-all

Accessibility Test Results: Government and Other Popular Websites

nirmita — 2011-08-17T08:50:16Z

The CIS conducted some automated accessibility tests on a few Government web sites, including that of the National Informatics Centre, and on the web sites of some banks, medical and educational institutions. This is a report of the results.

Summary

We carried out accessibility testing on the homepages of 23 sites using the automated tool at www.contentquality.com. Of the 23 sites tested, 21 failed automated verification and only the RBI and IIM-B websites passed verification on the basis of WCAG Priority 1 checkpoints. However, all 23 sites had issues with Priority 2 and Priority 3 checkpoints and failed on these criteria. Most sites also used layout tables, without linearized alternatives. Overall the sites that failed the fewest tests were RBI, IIM-B, RTI and CMC Vellore. On the additional test carried out on the quality of the alternative text, only the Ministry of HRD passed; this test was not applicable for the CMC Vellore, RBI, RTI, IIM-B and DDA sites; all others failed the test.

Even a basic automated verification tool, thus, demonstrates the deplorable state of public website accessibility in India, where all sites surveyed, except two, did not even conform to the basic accessibility criteria enumerated in the WCAG priority one checkpoints.

The section below lists the tests that most sites commonly failed; this is followed by a section with the actual test details, including information on the URL, time of test, status, browser emulated and checkpoints passed/failed.

Note:

The web content accessibility validation tool on www.contentquality.com, i.e. the HiSoftware Cynthia Says portal, is designed to identify errors in content related to Section 508 standards and the WCAG guidelines. This free tool is an online test which only validates one page at a time – the tests above were run for the homepages of the various sites and while this served as an initial automated accessibility check, this was by no means a comprehensive test for which more sophisticated tools as well as manual checking would be required.

Checkpoints

Priority 1

1.1 (a) Provide a text equivalent for every non-text element (e.g., via "alt", "longdesc", or in element content). This includes: images, graphical representations of text (including symbols), image map regions, animations (e.g., animated GIFs), applets and programmatic objects, ascii art, frames, scripts, images used as list bullets, spacers, graphical buttons, sounds (played with or without user interaction), stand-alone audio files, audio tracks of video, and video.

- RBI and CMC Vellore passed this, all others failed

6.3 (l),(m) Ensure that pages are usable when scripts, applets, or other programmatic objects are turned off or not supported. If this is not possible, provide equivalent information on an alternative accessible page.

12.1 (i) Title each frame to facilitate frame identification and navigation.

- HRD, DDA, NASSCOM, Hindu and Times of India failed. All others passed; in some cases this was not applicable.

Priority 2

7.4 Until user agents provide the ability to stop the refresh, do not create periodically auto-refreshing pages.

11.2 Avoid deprecated features of W3C technologies.

12.3 Divide large blocks of information into more manageable groups where natural and appropriate.

13.2 Provide metadata to add semantic information to pages and sites.

Priority 2 - Tables

3.2 Create documents that validate to published formal grammars.

5.3 Do not use tables for layout unless the table makes sense when linearized. Otherwise, if the table does not make sense, provide an alternative equivalent (which may be a linearized version).

Priority 2 - Forms

12.2 Describe the purpose of frames and how frames relate to each other if it is not obvious by frame titles alone.

12.4 Associate labels explicitly with their controls.

13.2 Provide metadata to add semantic information to pages and sites.

- All passed 7.4 . With regard to all the other checkpoints, some sites passed and others failed.

Priority 3

4.3 Identify the primary natural language of a document.

9.4 Create a logical tab order through links, form controls, and objects.

9.5 Provide keyboard shortcuts to important links (including those in client-side image maps), form controls, and groups of form controls.

10.5 Until user agents (including assistive technologies) render adjacent links distinctly, include non-link, printable characters (surrounded by spaces) between adjacent links.

Alternative text validation

1.1 Validate that the alt text does not use the word image When users add alternative text to an image they tend to add the word "Image" when it really says nothing about the image, but describes the object versus the meaning of the object. This check will fail a page for the use of the word image in the alternative text.

1.2 Validate that the alt text does not contain the text: .jpg, .gif, .bmp, .jpeg Many content creation tools will automatically add alternative text when you add an image to your content. The text is generally the image name. Validate that: .jpg, .gif, .bmp, .jpeg, are not found in the alt text.

1.3 Validate that the alt text does not contain the text "image" Many content creation tools will automatically add alternative text when you add an image to your content. The text is generally the image name or the word image with a number associated, like image001. This checkpoint will fail a page if the string image is found in the alternative text.

2.1 Validate that Alternative Text is greater than 7 and less than 81 characters in length Short alternative text may not be valid, warn the report user if alternative text was found that is less than seven characters in length. Additionally alternative text should not be larger than 80 characters, if the alt text is greater the long description attribute should be used. This check validates that the alt attribute does not exceed 80 characters in length.

2.2 Validate that Alternative Text is not used to repeat words Alternative text should not be used to simply hide words with the hope of increasing your ranking on search engines. If you repeat a word more than 5 times your page may not be indexed.

- Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha, JNU, IITD, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, AIIMS and NASSCOM failed on all these 4 points. Other results were split, with some passes and some failures

TEST DETAILS

National Informatics Centre

Verified File Name: http://indiaimage.nic.in/

Date and Time: 11/27/2008 12:01:55 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 6.3;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1, 13.3, 12.2; Failed 11.2, 13.2, 12.4
Priority 3 - Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 10.5
Alt text quality – Passed 1.2, 2.2; Failed 1.1, 1.6; Warning 2.1;

Lok Sabha

Verified File Name: http://loksabha.gov.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 1:11:21 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Failed 1.1
Priority 2 – Passed 7.4, 12.3; Failed 11.2, 13.2, 12.4,
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5,10.5
5.3 – used lots of tables
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Rajya Sabha

http://rajyasabha.gov.in/

Verified File Name: http://rajyasabha.gov.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 3:32:13 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Failed 1.1
Priority 2 – Passed 7.4, 13.1; Failed 3.2, 12.4
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Ministry of Human Resources

http://education.nic.in/

Verified File Name: http://education.nic.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 3:43:36 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Failed 1.1, 6.3
Priority 2 – Passed 7.4, 12.4, 13.1; Failed 3.2, 11.2
Priority 3 – Passed 9.5,10.5 Failed : 4.3,9.4
Alt text quality – Passed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Ministry of Urban Affairs

http://urbanindia.nic.in/moud/moud.htm

Verified File Name: http://urbanindia.nic.in/moud/moud.htm
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 9:11:56 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5 ; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Delhi Development Authority:

Verified File Name: http://www.dda.org.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 9:56:31 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

http://www.dda.org.in/

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 6.3
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1; Failed 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5 ; Warning 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – N/A

Railways

http://www.indianrail.gov.in/

Verified File Name: http://www.indianrail.gov.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:01:28 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1, 13.2, 12.4 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2
Priority 3 – Passed 4.3, 10.5; Failed 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment

http://socialjustice.nic.in/

Verified File Name: http://socialjustice.nic.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:07:22 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 12.4 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Ministry of Law and Justice

http://lawmin.nic.in/

Verified File Name: http://lawmin.nic.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:50:36 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1, 12.4; Failed 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

RTI

http://www.rti.gov.in

Verified File Name: http://www.rti.gov.in
Date and Time: 11/26/2008 3:54:10 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Passed 1.1, 6.3; Failed 12.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 11.2, 13.1, 12.4; Failed 3.2, 13.2, 12.2
Priority 3 – Passed 9.4, 9.5, 10.5; Failed 4.3
Alt text quality – N/A

NCERT

Verified File Name: http://www.ncert.nic.in/index.htm
Date and Time: 11/26/2008 6:22:59 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 –Failed 1.1, 6.3, 7.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 13.1, 12.4, 12.2; Failed 3.2, 13.2, 11.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

JNU

http://www.jnu.ac.in/

Verified File Name: http://www.jnu.ac.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 4:00:11 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Failed 1.1, 7.1
Priority 2 – Passed 7.4 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.1, 13.2, 12.4
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

IIT Delhi

http://www.iitd.ac.in/

Verified File Name: http://www.iitd.ac.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 5:07:01 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 – Passed 6.3; Failed 1.1, 7.1
Priority 2 – Passed 7.4, 13.1,12.2, 12.4; Failed 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

AIIMS

http://www.aiims.edu/

Verified File Name: http://www.aiims.edu/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:11:37 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 7.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4,12.4, 13.1 ; Failed 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

CMC Vellore

http://home.cmcvellore.ac.in/

Verified File Name: http://home.cmcvellore.ac.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:15:44 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Passed 1.1; Failed 12.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 11.2, 12.4, 13.1 ; Failed 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 9.4, 9.5, 10.5; Failed 4.3
Alt text quality – N/A

IIM Ahmedabad

http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/

Verified File Name: http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:19:46 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 12.4, 13.1 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

IIM Bangalore

Verified File Name: http://www.iimb.ernet.in/
Date and Time: 11/26/2008 6:27:18 AM
Passed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Passed 1.1, 6.3;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 11.2, 12.4, 13.1; Failed 3.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 9.4, 9.5, 10.5; Failed 4.3
Alt text quality – N/A

IIM Calcutta

Verified File Name: http://www.iimcal.ac.in/
Date and Time: 11/26/2008 6:30:42 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Passed 6.3; Failed 1.1
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 12.4, 13.1; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

State Bank of India

http://www.sbi.co.in/

Verified File Name: http://www.sbi.co.in/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:26:29 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 12.4; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.1, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

Reserve Bank of India

http://www.rbi.org.in/home.aspx

Verified File Name: http://www.rbi.org.in/home.aspx
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:36:25 AM
Passed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Passed 1.1;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4, 11.2, 13.1, 12.4; Failed 3.2, 13.2
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – N/A
http://www.rbi.org.in/commonman/English/Scripts/Home.aspx

NASSCOM

http://www.nasscom.in/Default.aspx

Verified File Name: http://www.nasscom.in/Default.aspx
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 10:47:00 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 6.3;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4; Failed 11.2, 13.1, 13.2, 12.4
Priority 3 – Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5, 10.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

The Hindu

http://www.hinduonnet.com/

Verified File Name: http://www.hinduonnet.com/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 11:00:09 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 6.3;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.1, 13.2, 12.4
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

The Times of India

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/

Verified File Name: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/
Date and Time: 11/25/2008 11:22:15 AM
Failed Automated Verification
Emulated Browser: MS Internet Explorer 6.0

Priority 1 - Failed 1.1, 6.3;
Priority 2 - Passed 7.4 ; Failed 3.2, 11.2, 13.1, 13.2, 12.4
Priority 3 – Passed 10.5; Failed 4.3, 9.4, 9.5
Alt text quality – Failed 1.1, 1.2, 1.6, 2.2; Warning 2.1

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-of-accessibility-tests-conducted-on-some-government-and-other-popular-web-sites

Report on the Internet Governance Forum

sachia — 2011-08-23T04:51:55Z

CIS attended the UN Internet Governance Forum in Hyderabad, December 3-7, 2008.

As an outcome of the UN Internet Governance Forum (IGF) which took place in Hyderabad from December 3-7, 2008,

(a) CIS entered into an agreement with the W3C to make translations of the WCAG 2.0 guidelines into some Indian languages; and

(b) CIS, the UN Solutions Exchange group and the Daisy Forum of India (DFI) decided to work together on the web accessibility issue and form a core group of organizations across the disability sector for this purpose.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/igf-report-1

Follow-up Letter in Support of WIPO Treaty for Reading Disabled

sachia — 2011-08-25T08:43:42Z

CIS has sent another letter to the Department of Higher Education, Ministry for Human Resource Development, petitioning it to support the WIPO Treaty for the reading disabled.

In November last year, CIS launched a nation wide signature campaign to support the treaty for the blind, visually impaired and other reading disabled proposed by the World Blind Union to the WIPO. Since then, the list of signatories was updated. In May 2009, WIPO's Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) held another meeting, and in light of this, the endorsement of the treaty and appeal to the government to support it was resubmitted, by an increased number of signatories, including members of the DAISY Forum of India.

The letter and list of signatories is available below.

Mr. R. P. Aggarwal
Secretary

Department of Higher Education
Ministry of Human Resource Development
‘C’ Wing, Shastri Bhavan
New Delhi-110001

Dear Sir,

Re: Letter of support for the proposed Treaty for the blind and visually impaired submitted by the World Blind Union.

We were extremely gratified that the Government took note of our letter in November, 2008, containing endorsements of 16 organisations urging the government to support the Treaty for the Blind, which was proposed by the World Blind Union in the WIPO SCCR meeting from Nov 1^st-6^th,2008. In light of the fact that there is another SCCR meeting scheduled from May 25^th-29^th, where this issue is to be taken up, we are resubmitting our endorsement and urgent plea to the Government to actively support this treaty, since it will be extremely beneficial to all blind, visually challenged and print disabled persons in India. The list of endorsers has expanded to include about 50 more organizations. There are many more who have verbally expressed support. We look forward to an active response from the Government on this. Thanking you,

Yours Faithfully,

Nirmita Narasimhan
Programme Manager
(Centre for Internet and Society)

Sr. No	Name of Organization	Contact Person
1	Akhil Bharatiya Drishtiheen Kalyan Sangh,	Mr. Ajay M. Joshi
2	Amulya Sahara	Sh. Ashok Kumar Goyal
3	Andhjan Kalyan Trust,	Mr. Praful N. Vyas
4	Arushi	Sh. Anil Mudgal
5	Astha	Ms Radhika M. Alkazi,
6	Atmajyoti Vikas Samitee	Mrs. Priti Yadav
7	Blind People's Association (Ahmedabad)	Mr. R.P. Soni
8	Blind Person's Association (Kolkata)	Mr. Amiyo Biswas
9	Blind Welfare Council	Sh. Yusuf Kapadiya
10	Centre For Internet And Society	Sunil Abraham,
11	Devnar Foundation for the Blind	Dr. A. Saibaba Goud
12	Discipleship Centre	Mr. John A
13	Farook College	Prof. K. Kuttialikutty
14	Hans Raj Mahila Maha Vidyalaya	Ms. Prabha Puran Sharma
15	Human Development Institute	Ms. R.C. Meena
16	Indian Association for the Blind	Mr. S.M.A. Jinnah,
17	Indira Mahila Mandal Hudco New Nandeds	Sh. Nagnath Ramji Kadam
18	Jamia Millia Islamia	Prof. Zubair Meenal,
19	Janta Adarsh Andh Vidyalaya	Mrs. Kalpana Sharma
20	Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya	Rajesh Gupta
21	Jyoti Sroat School	Bertha G. Dkhar
22	L.V. Prasad Eye Institute	Mr./Ms. Beula Christy
23	Lakshmi Bai College	Dr. Nalini Govind
24	Maulana AzadLibrary(AligarhMuslim Universit)	Mr. Shakeel Ahmad Khan Mr. Shakeel Ahmad Khan
25	Mitra Jyothi	Ms. Madhu Singhal
26	Montfort Centre For Education	Mr. Michael Mathew
27	National Association for the Blind, Delhi
28	NAB-Phiroze &NoshirMerwanjiRehabilitationCentre for the Blind (Mount Abu)	Sh. Vimal Kumar Dengla
29	National Association for the Blind (Uttarakhand)	Mr. Shyam Dhanak,
30	National Association for the Blind (Chandigarh)	Sh. Vinod Chadha
31	National Association for the Blind (H.)	Ms. Shalini Vats Kimta
32	National Association for the Blind (India)	Sh. Suhas V. Karnik
33	National Association for the Blind(Jharkhand)	Sh. Ar. Sahay
34	National Association for the Blind(Junagad)	Ms. Rinaben V. Jasani
35	National Association for the Blind (Karnataka),	(Mrs.) Saroja Ramachandra
36	National Association for the Blind (Kerala)	Sh. Manoj Kurian
37	National Association for the Blind (Sikkim Branch)	Mr. Rajesh Verma
38	National Association for the Blind(West Bengal)	Sh. Arup Chakroborty
39	National Federation of the Blind (Guwahati)	Mohd. Imran Ali
40	North Ex. Blind Welfare & Educational Society	Sh. Subhash Garg
41	Orissa Association for the Blind	Sh. Bihari Nayak
42	Rajasthan Netraheen Kalyan Sangh	Sh. Jitendra Bhargava
43	Ramakrishna Mission Blind Boys' Academy	Sh. Sunilbaran Pattanayak
44	Saksham	Ms. Deepika Sood,
45	Salwan Public School	Mrs. Vandana Puri
46	Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled	Sh. Ganesh
47	Samrita Trust	Sh. Seetarama Sastry Nori
48	School for the Deaf Mutes Society	Dr. Homiyar Mobedji
49	Score Foundation,	George Abraham
50	Shikshit Yuva Sewa Samiti Basti	Mr. Gopal Krishna Agarwal
51	Shree Andhjan Vividhlaxi Talim Kendra,	Sh. Prakash Mankodi
52	Shri Navchetan Andhjan Mandal,	Sh. Himanshu Sampura
53	Shri Venkateswara College	Ayesha Maliwal
54	Shri Vrajlal Durlabhji Parekh Andh Mahila Vikas Grah,	Sh. P.J. Mankodi
55	Shruti Information Centre of Yashoda Charitable Trust	Ms. Sonal Sena
56	Shubham	Dr. Sangeeta Agarwal
57	Springdales School	Ms. Sonali Bose
58	St. Mary's School
59	Tagore International School,	Ms. Aparna Sharma
60	The Blind Relief Association (Delhi)	Sh. Kailash Chandra Pande
61	University of Hyderabad	Dr. Madhireddy Anjaneyulu
62	Venu Eye Institute & Research Centre	Ms. Tanuja Joshi
63	Victoria Memorial School for the Blind	Mrs. Radha Subrahmanian
64	Welfare Centre For Visually Handicapped,	Mr. Profulla Kumar Rout
65	Welfare Society for the Blind,	Smt. Jharna Sur
66	Xavier's Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged (XRCVC)	Dr. Sam Taraporevala
67	Sense International (India)	Akhil Paul
68	N. Krishnaswamy Barrier Break Technologies (Mumbai)	Shilpi Kapoor
69	National Association for the Blind (NAB) Bangalore	Mr. Pruthviraj
70	National Federation for the Blind (Delhi)	S.K.Rungta
71	Mitrajyoti (Bangalore)	Madhu Singhal
72	Accessability (New Delhi)	Vikas Sharma
73	Alternative Law Forum (Bangalore)	Lawrence Liang
74	Acrodelon Technologies Pvt Ltd(Chennai)	Rahul Cherian
75	Enable India	Shanthi Raghavan
76	College Students and Graduates Association of the Blind(Chennai)	Ponmudi
77	Indian Association for the Blind(Chennai)	S.M.A. Jinnah
78	Prayatna(Chennai & Bangalore)	Aruna Sankaranarayanan
79	Worth Trust, Katpadi (TN)	Venki/Mike

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/follow-up-letter-in-support-of-wipo-treaty-for-reading-disabled

Report on Second National Workshop on Web Accessibility, 5-7 June 2009

sachia — 2013-02-04T05:52:05Z

Nirmita Narsimhan reports on the second National Workshop on Web Accessibility for web developers, hosted by CIS in Bangalore from 5 to 7 June 2009, and attended by 15 participants.

The second National Workshop on Web Accessibility for web developers was held at the CIS office in Bangalore, 5-7 June 2009. Although this was intended to be more a city-based workshop, we still got participants from other states such as Kerala, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. There were in all 15 participants predominantly from the web development and web designing backgrounds, college students and even a person from the academic field and 3 trainers. There were also some who had already prior knowledge of accessibility and this helped to raise the level of issues which were being discussed from a basic level to a more advanced level. Overall, the workshop was extremely well received and many of the participants expressed their willingness to participate in more such workshops in the future.

The workshop was structured differently from the last one--the sessions were more practical-oriented and the trainers stressed a lot on group work. There were sessions on understanding disability, WCAG 2.0 principles and group exercises of designing accessible pages. This workshop featured some additional topics such as Flash accessibility, accessibility in documents and role play exercises for problem solving for different disabilities. For instance, in one of the sessions, the participants were asked to prepare a caption for a one minute video. One of the participants, already working on accessibility, demonstrated Orca for Linux.

Specific Outcomes

1. The participants understood the importance of creating accessible web pages and learnt about various techniques, tools and resources for accessibility.
2. All the presentations and lectures were video documented.
3. The participants filled up feed back forms and action points to be undertaken after the workshop. CIS distributed T-Shirts and certificates to all the participants.

To download a complete report on the workshop in pdf format, please click here.

Video

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/second-national-workshop

Response to the Call from Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry for Review of the Copyright Act

sachia — 2011-08-17T08:51:23Z

This blog entry contains a letter sent by Rahul Cherian of Indojuris and Nirmita Narsimhan of the Centre for Internet and Society in response to a call from the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry for review of the Copyright Act.

The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has recently constituted a Consultative Working Group to analyse various issues in the Copyright Act. This has been approved by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP). The group is to be chaired by Shri Amit Khare, Joint Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development. The purpose of the Consultative Working Group would be to look into the existing provisions of the copyright law and the proposed amendments, as well as into the international arrangements and suggestions. The Consultative Working Group is expected to submit its report along with amendments or suggestion, as required.

Rahul Cherian of Indojuris and Nirmita Narasimhan of CIS have submitted a report on the provisions of the Copyright Act with respect to the limitations for print disabled persons. This has been submitted in the form of a letter to Sheetal Chopra of FICCI; the letter is reproduced below.

-----

Sheetal Chopra

Senior Assistant Director and Head

IPR Division

FICCI

Dear Madam:

Subject: Consultative Working Group on Copyright Issues – issues to be addressed by the Consultative Working Group.

As required by you we give below the issues to be addressed by the Consultative Working Group. This document is prepared by Nirmita Narasimhan of the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, and Rahul Cherian Jacob of IndoJuris Law Offices, Chennai.

Scope - Exceptions and Limitations for Print Impaired Persons

The scope of the issues raised here are limited to the exceptions and limitations under the Copyright Act that are required to facilitate access of books by the visually impaired and other print impaired persons.

Problem faced by Print Impaired Persons

India has approximately 70 million Print Impaired Persons (loosely defined as persons who are unable to access print as a result of disability and include persons who are visually impaired, persons who have learning disabilities such as dyslexia and persons who due to physical disability are unable to hold a book or turn pages) who do not have access to knowledge due to a lack of reading material in accessible formats. It is estimated that even in developed countries not more than 5% of publications get converted into accessible formats for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons. As a result, Print Impaired Persons are excluded from the education system, are unable to seek meaningful employment and are on the whole excluded from all aspects of civil society.

It is observed that publishers do not make available books in formats accessible by Print Impaired Persons and the Copyright Act does not provide exceptions and limitations to the rights of the copyright owner for third parties to convert and make available books in accessible formats for Print Impaired Persons. This has lead to a “book famine” from the perspective of Print Impaired Persons.

Technological Advances and Accessible Formats

Till a few years ago, Print Impaired Persons had to rely on audio files and Braille (in the case of the persons who became visually impaired at a young age) to enjoy printed matter. Each of these formats have severe limitations. For example audio files have to be played serially and navigation is severely limited. In the case of Braille, the printing costs are expensive, reading a Braille book is up to 4 times slower than a normal book, Braille is extremely difficult to learn if you loose sight at a later age, and persons using Braille can communicate only with others who know Braille. However with the information technology revolution and the creation of text-to-speech screen readers that read out documents in electronic formats to Print Impaired Persons there are now countless ways in which Print Impaired Persons can access books in any easy and simple manner. Specialized electronic formats such as the DAISY Format not only permit the visually impaired to “read” the material using screen readers but also permit a digital file to be printed in Braille for the blind, in large print for the partially sighted and also provide audio with inbuilt search and indexation features for those Print Impaired Persons who have computers. The key is that technological innovation now provides the much-needed flexibility required by Print Impaired Persons to access material in formats they are most comfortable with. However the availability of these technology solutions alone does not solve the problem of dearth of books in formats that can be enjoyed by Print Impaired Persons.

Legal compulsions for providing exceptions and limitations for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons

At present Indian copyright law does not provide exceptions and limitations to the rights of copyright owners for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons. The Indian Constitution expressly provides for “equality” (Article 14), “non-discrimination” (Article 15), “freedom of speech and expression” (Article 19), and “right to life” (Article 21). Indian courts have not yet had the opportunity to pronounce any judgment on whether the Constitution requires copyright law to provide exceptions and limitations for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons. However, Indian courts have routinely upheld the rights of persons with disability and the Supreme Court has specifically recognized that the “right to life” as enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution includes right to dignity including basic necessities such as reading and writing. Right to education has also been recognized as a fundamental right. For Print Impaired Persons to enjoy their fundamental rights it is essential that they have access to material, including but not limited to educational material, in accessible formats. As present, 70 million Indians cannot enjoy their fundamental rights due to the fact that the Copyright Act does not provide exemptions and limitations for Print Impaired Persons. It is to be noted that about 50 countries around the world already provide copyright exceptions and limitations for the benefit of the visually impaired/printed impaired.

India has also ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the objects of the aforesaid convention include providing persons with disability, access, on an equal basis with others, to information and communication. Indian courts have read into Indian law provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. It is also to be noted that the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights of the World Intellectual Property Organisation is currently discussing the proposed WIPO Treaty for Blind, Visually Impaired and Other Reading Disabled Persons.

India has also recognized the requirements of Print Impaired Persons and had circulated draft amendments to the Copyright Act in _________ for feedback and comments from the public. All the leading organisations representing visually impaired persons has submitted their responses stating that the proposed amendments did not adequately meet the requirements of visually impaired persons.

In light of the above the question is not whether exceptions and limitations for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons must be provided (they must), but what form these exceptions and limitations must take.

Exceptions and Limitations – Issues to be considered

Given below are the issues that must be considered when providing exceptions and limitations for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons.

Beneficiaries – The beneficiaries of any amendment should include all persons with disability who, due to that disability, need an accessible format to access a book to substantially the same degree as a person without a disability. This definition should be functional and not medical since medical definitions cannot be exhaustive.

Formats – Print Impaired Persons should be able to enjoy the benefits of the information technology revolution in the same way that non-disabled persons have been able to. Any amendment should therefore take into account technological developments and should be format neutral to give full flexibility and utility to Print Impaired Persons. As mentioned above Braille as a format has limited application and a majority of visually impaired persons are not able to use Braille. Moreover, Braille cannot be used by persons with other print impairments such as dyslexia or persons with physical disabilities.

Permitted Activities – The activities permitted by any amendment should include the making of accessible formats of a work, supplying that accessible format, or copies of that format, to Print Impaired Persons by any means, including by lending or by electronic communication by wire or wireless means, and undertaking any intermediate steps to achieve these objectives.

Who can conduct the Permitted Activities – It is noted that the cost of making an accessible copy of a book is far higher than the cost of the book itself. It is observed that non-profit organisations have been able to convert only a few thousands books till date due to lack of funds. Print Impaired Persons, their families and other members of their support group also convert books into accessible formats at very high cost. The number of books converted by these persons is also minimal. Keeping in mind the fact that publishers are not selling books in accessible formats there appears to be complete market failure in this area. The solution for this problem appears to be that, apart from non-profit organisations, Print Impaired Persons and their support group being permitted to conduct the Permitted Activities, volunteers and for-profit organisations should also be able to conduct the Permitted Activities. If any of the Permitted Activity is undertaken for profit, then the entity carrying out the Permitted Activity must give notice to, and pay prescribed royalty to the copyright owner. The quantum of royalty payable should be determined keeping in mind the fact that the average income of Print Impaired Persons is far lower than the income of non disabled persons. The possibility of creating a collecting society for this purpose can also be explored.

Conclusion

“Inclusiveness” is the underlying theme of the Indian Constitution and “Inclusion” is a word used liberally by the courts and politicians alike. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability. The United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons of Disabilities aims to support the full and effective participation of persons with disabilities in social life and development; and to advance the rights and protect the dignity of persons with disabilities and to promote equal access to employment, education, information, goods and services.

However, these concepts mean nothing to Print Impaired Persons as long as their most basic fundamental rights continue to be denied due to the fact that Indian copyright law does not provide exceptions and limitations for the benefit of Print Impaired Persons.

In light of the above, appropriate amendments must be made to the Copyright Act as soon as possible to remove the barriers placed before Print Impaired Persons that prevent their exercise of fundamental rights.

If you require any additional information or any clarification regarding the above please let us know. Thank you and best regards,

Nirmita Narasimhan and Rahul Cherian

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/response-to-ficcis-call-for-review-of-the-copyright-act

Copyright Challenges for Print Impaired Persons in India

nirmita — 2011-08-17T08:51:33Z

Print impaired persons in India face several hurdles in accessing reading materials- the biggest one being the Indian Copyright Act 1957

Background

The Indian Constitution guarantees citizens fundamental rights to dignity, to read, to education, to information and to expression.
India has approximately 70 million disabled persons who are unable to participate in the social, cultural and political life of the country because they cannot access materials in the printed form. These include persons with visual disabilities, persons whose physical impairments prevent them from holding or turning pages of a book and persons who have a learning disability like dyslexia. These groups can access reading materials if they are converted into formats which can be accessed by them in an alternate manner using assistive technologies.
Recent developments in technologies such as screen reading and OCR technology, electronic tactile devices, evolution of multiple audio, audio-video and electronic formats, DAISY etc which can be adapted for use in a multiplicity of platforms have opened up innumerable possibilities for persons with different abilities to access information independently and participate in society.
The process of conversion of a printed book into an alternate accessible format such as large print, audio, Braille and electronic formats involves special effort in terms of obtaining permissions from copyright holders, possessing manpower, infrastructure and monitory resources, concerted involvement of intermediary agencies undertaking conversion and the presence of an effective distribution model.

Challenges in India

Today, print impaired persons in India are faced with several problems that hamper their participation in society-

Lack of availability of affordable technological solutions in English as well as local languages
Lack of availability of printed materials in formats that can be accessed using these technologies
Failure on the part of technology and web developers to adhere to principles of universal design which ensure that web sites are accessible to persons with disabilities
Lack of accessible or compatible mainstream technologies to work with special technologies
Lack of an enabling legal regime.

Disability Awareness around the world

The United Nations declared the decade of 1983-1992 as the decade of Persons with Disabilities and the decade of 1993-2002 as the Asian and Pacific decade of persons with disabilities. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities came into force from 2008.
International bodies like the World Wide Consortium (W3C) and the Daisy Consortium have come out with standards and guidelines which will make the web and publications on the web universally accessible.
The World Blind Union (WBU) has recently proposed a Treaty for the Blind, Visually Impaired and other Reading Disabled, (referred to as the “VIP initiative”) which seeks to harmonise limitations and exceptions at a global level so that countries around the world can freely share knowledge in accessible formats for print impaired persons. This Treaty is now being proposed by three Latin American countries and is presently tabled before the WIPO and is under discussion.

Position in India

The Indian Copyright Act 1957 does not make any provision for the conversion and distribution of books in accessible formats for print impaired persons. Hence organisations serving the print impaired have to get permissions from copyright holders to undertake conversions. Further, Indian organisations are not able to borrow accessible materials from libraries in other countries since the absence of such a provision in our fair dealing clause prevents countries from lending books to print impaired persons in India.
In the case of books published in India, there are no accessible copies readily available in the market and while many publishers in principle are not averse to giving permission, the unwanted fear of piracy and lack of awareness prevents them from allowing organisations to undertake conversions. Consequently print impaired persons are denied the freedom to choose and read any book which is freely available to the public.
In the light of increasing global attention in this matter and in the interests of the large print impaired community in India, we need to have a clear position in our law with regard to converting materials into accessible formats for print challenged persons. It is important to understand this as not merely a legal issue, but also as a social and economic cause. We need to work at various levels to solve this problem:

We need to work towards legally binding norms both at a national as well as international level. We can achieve this by supporting the proposed treaty for improved access for the visually impaired at the WIPO, and by ensuring that necessary amendments are immediately incorporated into the Copyright Act, which afford flexibilities for conversion into accessible formats for print Impaired person.
Publishers, copyright holders, organisations and print impaired persons should work collaboratively towards conversion and distribution of published works in accessible formats. Publishers should give digitised copies of books in an accessible format to recognised organisations serving the print Impaired and in return these organisations should set up a distribution mechanism which will ensure that these accessible books get circulated only within the print impaired community and do not find their way into the mainstream market.
Publishers should explore the large market in India for selling books in electronic, audio and other accessible formats along with the print copy. These copies should be available in the market at the same time and at the same price that the print copy becomes available. In the case of electronic copies, publishers may also consider selling the books at a price which is lesser than the price of the print version since this will not involve cost of paper publication.
Publishers should adopt a standard format for creating digital masters of their publications so that all distribution formats including hard copy print, braille, talking book and digital publications can be derived out of it without wastage of resources on conversions and reproduction of books in accessible formats.
The government should frame incentive schemes for publishers and other persons developing technologies to encourage them to create accessible versions of their content and technologies.
We need to work towards ensuring at least the minimum basic study and reference materials which are required for children with print disabilities to complete their school and college level education in all subjects and languages.
We need to encourage peer to peer models amongst disabled persons and organisations for sharing and generating more accessible content.
We need to work towards establishing public libraries and repositories of accessible content with a healthy system of exchange amongst them.
Work towards generating more Indian language content and developing technologies such as text to speech synthesisers which support regional Indian language content.
We need to work towards facilitating cross-border exchange of books so that persons in India get exposure to foreign authors and also ensure that persons abroad are able to read Indian literature. Libraries in India should be able to freely exchange books with libraries in other countries.
We need to spread awareness about the importance of building in accessibility right at the start so that not much time, effort and money is wasted at a later stage in converting materials into accessible formats.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/copyright-challenges-for-print-impaired-persons-in-india

A Report on National Conference on ICTs for Differently Abled / Under privileged Communities in Education, Employment & Entreprenuership 2009

praskrishna — 2011-08-26T07:41:27Z

This is a report about the National Conference on ICTs for the differently abled / under privileged communities in education, employment and entreprenuership which was held at Loyola College in Chennai from 1 to 3 December 2009.

Click here for the full report.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-national-conference-ICTs

Right to Read in the European Parliament: A Report

praskrishna — 2011-10-20T13:44:57Z

The European Blind Union and the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue supported an event sponsored by seven MEPs in the European Parliament to discuss the way forward for EU to support the Treaty for the Blind, Visually Impaired and Other Reading Disabled which has been proposed at the World Intellectual Property Organisation by Brazil, Mexico, Ecuador and Paraguay.

Around 250-300 stakeholders, experts and EU officials came together to discuss the way forward for the EU to support a binding Treaty for the Blind. The half day event consisted of three panels. The first panel was titled 'how the blind read problems and solutions. The speakers were Rodolfo Catani (European Blind Union, Italy), Pete Osborne (Royal National Institute for the Blind, UK) and Nirmita Narasimhan (Centre for Internet and Society, India). The panel was moderated by Manon Ress (Knowledge Ecology International). The panelists focused on the technological developments which enabled reading, the lack of reading materials despite the availability of reading gadgets and the specific problems of developing countries which necessitate a Treaty. The second panel was titled Why a binding treaty for the visually impaired at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)? The speakers were Barbara Martin (Organización Nacional de Ciegos, Spain), James Love (Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue, USA), Dan Pescod (Royal National Institute for the Blind, UK) and Tilman Lüder (DG Markt, Head of Unit). The panel was moderated by MEP Ska Keller. The panel spent a lot of time answering queries of member states as to why there was the need for a binding treaty and why a soft instrument would not work at this stage. The final panel was: What is the opinion of the EP and the Commission. The speakers were MEPs: Ska Keller, Thijs Berman, Dieter-Lebrecht Koch, Oriol Junqueras Vies and Eva Lichtenberger followed by a response from Tilman Lüder (DG Markt, Head of Unit). MEP Thijs Bermanwas moderator and gave his closing remarks for the panel. He concluded with a very strong message to the EU member states to support the Treaty.

Read Nirmita's report on the event

Click here for the article in the Parliament

Click here for Knowledge Ecology International

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/right-to-read-europe