The Centre for Internet and Society
https://cis-india.org
These are the search results for the query, showing results 51 to 65.
National Resource Kit: The Sikkim Chapter (Call for Comments)
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-sikkim-chapter-call-for-comments
<b>The National Resource Kit team is pleased to bring you its research on the state of laws, policies and programmes for persons with disabilities in the state of Sikkim. </b>
<h2>Executive Summary</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">According to the 2001 Census, nearly 20,367 persons or 3% of the State population are identified as persons living with disabilities. The responsibility of ensuring the welfare of these persons with disabilities primarily rests with the Social Welfare Division of the Social Justice, Empowerment and Welfare Department of the Government of Sikkim. This Government department implements various policies, programmes and schemes aimed at the welfare and empowerment of persons living with disabilities.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Screening camps and medical camps emphasising the medical welfare of persons with disabilities are periodically arranged by the Government of Sikkim in conjunction with the STNM Government Hospital. Vide Notification No. 02/HC, HS&FW dated 30.01.09 by the Department of Healthcare, Human Services and Family Welfare, disability screening camps are to be arranged on specific dates of the month by the District Medical Board members in the respective District Hospitals accompanied by officers of the Sikkim Department of Social Justice, Empowerment and Welfare and the staff of various Deendayal District Rehabilitation Centres.<a href="#fn1" name="fr1">[1]</a></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Government of Sikkim has also introduced other measures such as the establishment of special schools for children with disabilities. The Social Welfare Department of Sikkim has established a Special School for Hearing impaired children in June 2004 at Sitchey Busty, Gangtok. The school is residential in nature, providing accommodation, education and other facilities towards ensuring the general welfare for children suffering from hearing impairments.<a href="#fn2" name="fr2">[2]</a></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Furthermore, the Sikkim Government attempts to spread its reach by collaborating with several non- governmental organisations or NGOs in the state. The Government of Sikkim provides certain NGOs with financial assistance, subject to the fulfilment of certain conditions. As a result, NGOs have been able to provide better treatment and rehabilitation facilities to persons suffering from disabilities and living in the State of Sikkim.<a href="#fn3" name="fr3">[3]</a></p>
<p><b>Accessibility<br /></b>The only measures introduced in Sikkim on accessibility is concessions in transport. Free travel facility to the blind is provided in state owned buses.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Apart from the the State’s IT Policy issued by the Department of Information Technology states that it will develop special software for providing IT access to persons with visual impairment, cerebral palsy, speech and hearing disorders in association with NGOs and local enterpreuners. It is not clear if such software has already been developed by the State.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Education</b><br />The State of Sikkim provides special measures to children with disabilities in the pursuit of their education.</p>
<ul>
<li><span>Stipends and Scholarship Schemes</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
</ul>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">A stipend of Rs. 500/- per month per child, and Rs.500 per annum towards their studies in special schools outside of the state are provided for by the Department of Social Justice, Empowerment and Welfare. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The Government also provides a scholarship amount of Rs. 50 per month to every child studying in Class I to VI, Rs. 60 per month to every child in Class VII and Class VIII, and finally Rs.85 per month for every student in Class IX to XII. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">A scholarship amount of Rs. 800 per month is provided to students desirous of pursuing their higher education in institutions established outside of Sikkim, and Rs. 2000 for all those students wishing to pursue their higher education in institutions in the State of Sikkim.<a href="#fn4" name="fr4">[4]</a></li>
</ol>
<ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><span>Special Schools </span><br />The Social Welfare Division has established a Special School for the Hearing impaired children in June 2004 at Sitchey Busty, Gangtok. It is a residential School where accommodation, education and general welfare for the hearing impaired children are provided.</p>
</ul>
<p><b>Employment</b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Reservation in Government Jobs: By Office Order No. 5/SW dated 31.12.1990, in Grade 'C' and 'D' posts reservation are provided in direct recruitment for physically handicapped persons as indicated below:</li>
</ul>
<ol>
<li>Visually handicapped - 1%</li>
<li>Orthopaedically handicapped – 1%</li>
<li>Hearing handicapped - 1%</li>
</ol>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Conveyance Allowance: Government and PSU employees who are blind and locomotor disabled are provided conveyance allowance.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Self-Employment: Persons with disabilities receive assistance for self-employment.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Vocational Training: Vocational training is given to persons with disabilities in sheltered workshops.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Health and Rehabilitation<br /></b></p>
<ul>
<li>Aids and appliances: Persons with disabilities get free of cost prosthetic equipment.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Assistance to Disabled Persons for Purchase/Fitting of Aids and Appliances (ADIP) Scheme: As per the implementation of this Central Scheme, the Government of Sikkim provides assistance to those persons with disabilities who are in need of durable, sophisticated and scientifically manufactured, modern, standard aids and appliances. The purpose of this scheme is to ensure the promotion of the physical, social and psychological rehabilitation of persons with disabilities by reducing the effects of disabilities and to thereby enhance their economic potential. Aids and appliances that are provided include walking sticks, crutches, and wheel chairs. These appliances have been distributed to those persons with disabilities belonging to families living Below the Poverty Line (BPL).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Deendayal District Rehabilitation Scheme: Under this scheme, the Government of Sikkim has established a district disability rehabilitation centre in at STNM Hospital complex Gangtok in 2000. This DDRC has been working towards the rehabilitation of persons living with disabilities in Sikkim. In an effort to further facilitate the proper rehabilitation of persons with disabilities, the Government of Sikkim has made available the facilities of a Mobile Disability Van and a Mobile Rehabilitation Unit Van. In the Fiscal Year of 2009-10, 526 aids and appliances were distributed from the Deendayal District Rehabilitation Centre and 9 disability camps were conducted with two camps having been held in the Western district of the State, three in the South and East and one in the North.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Social Protection<br /></b></p>
<ul>
<li>Disability Pension: Persons with disability above 40 years of age are provided disability pension of Rs. 100/- per month. Blind persons also get Rs. 100/- per month.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Indira Gandhi National Disability Pension Scheme: The State of Sikkim provides social protection to persons with disabilities by way of local implementation of the Indira Gandhi National Disability Pension Scheme. The purpose of the scheme is to provide persons with disabilities in the age group of 18 to 64 years, who are members of families living below the poverty line, with a certain sum of money in order to provide for their welfare. The beneficiaries under this scheme include all those persons suffering from severe or multiple disabilities as defined under the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995and the ‘National Trust for the Welfare of Persons with Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Mental Retardation and Multiple Disabilities Act, 1999 (National Trust Act 1999)’. In total, beneficiaries under this scheme receive an amount of Rs. 600/- per month.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Subsistence Allowance: Under the auspices of the Department of Social Justice, Empowerment and Welfare, the Sikkim Government provides a subsistence allowance amounting to Rs. 600 per month to persons with disabilities living in the state. In order to avail of the benefits under this scheme, beneficiaries must show that they are suffering from atleast 40% disability and that they should be a resident of the state of Sikkim. Furthermore, the beneficiary must hail from a family identified as a BPL or below the poverty line family. </li>
</ul>
<ul>
</ul>
<hr />
<p>[<a href="#fr1" name="fn1">1</a>]. <a href="http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/Camps.aspx">http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/Camps.aspx</a></p>
<p>[<a href="#fr2" name="fn2">2</a>]. <a href="http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/SchoolForDeaf.aspx">http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/SchoolForDeaf.aspx</a></p>
<p>[<a href="#fr3" name="fn3">3</a>]. <a href="http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/AsstToVolOrg.aspx">http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/AsstToVolOrg.aspx</a></p>
<p>[<a href="#fr4" name="fn4">4</a>]. <a href="http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/WelfareForHandicapped.aspx">http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/WelfareForHandicapped.aspx</a></p>
<p>[<a href="#fr5" name="fn5">5</a>]. <a href="http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/IGNDS.aspx">http://sikkimsocialwelfare.in/General/SocialWelfare/IGNDS.aspx</a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-sikkim-chapter-call-for-comments'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-sikkim-chapter-call-for-comments</a>
</p>
No publisherManojna YeluriAccessibility2013-11-07T06:14:43ZBlog EntryMaking Voices Heard: Privacy, Inclusivity, and Accessibility of Voice Interfaces in India
https://cis-india.org/raw/making-voices-heard-project-announcement
<b>We believe that voice interfaces have the potential to democratise the use of internet by addressing barriers such as accessibility concerns, lack of abilities of reading and writing on digital text interfaces, and lack of options for people to interact with digital devices in their own languages. Through the Making Voice Heard Project supported by Mozilla Corporation, we will examine the current landscape of voice interfaces in India.</b>
<p> </p>
<img src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_01.jpg" alt="null" width="30%" /> <img src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_02.jpg" alt="null" width="30%" /> <img src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_03.jpg" alt="null" width="30%" />
<p> </p>
<h4>Download the project announcement cards (shown above): <a href="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_01.jpg" target="_blank">Card 01</a>, <a href="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_02.jpg" target="_blank">Card 02</a>, and <a href="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cis-india/website/master/img/CIS_Mozilla_MakingVoicesHeard_ProjectAnnouncement_03.jpg" target="_blank">Card 03</a></h4>
<hr />
<h3>Making Voices Heard: Project Announcement</h3>
<p>Although voice enabled interfaces are being deployed there is a need to understand how they are beneficial, and what have been important knowledge gaps and challenges in their development, adoption, use, and regulation. Through the Making Voice Heard Project <a href="https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2019/07/05/mozillas-latest-research-grants-prioritizing-research-for-the-internet/" target="_blank">supported by Mozilla Corporation</a>, we will be examining the current landscape of voice interfaces in India, and seek to address the following questions:</p>
<ul>
<li>What is the broad (sectoral and functional) typology of available voice interfaces in Indian languages? How widely are these voice interfaces (in Indian languages) used, and what barriers prevent their further adoption and use?<br /><br /></li>
<li>What are concerns related to privacy and data protection that emerge with the growth of voice interfaces? What kind of protocols for data processing may need to be built into the design of these interfaces?<br /><br /></li>
<li>How accessible are these interfaces for persons with disabilities (PWDs)? What kinds of accessibility features, especially for Indian languages, may need to be developed to ensure effective use of voice technologies by PWDs?<br /><br /></li>
<li>Where do challenges in these three areas intersect? For instance, is compromising on users’ privacy, including weak or missing data protection regulations, required to create comprehensive speech datasets that may help develop better accessibility features, and address linguistic barriers?</li></ul>
<p>In order to approach these questions we have begun mapping the various developers and users of voice interfaces in India. In the next stage of the process we will be looking at these interfaces through the lens of privacy, language, accessibility, and design. In order to add to the mapping and questions, we will be conducting interviews and workshops with users, developers, designers and researchers of voice interfaces in India, including the <a href="https://voice.mozilla.org/en" target="_blank">Common Voice</a> team at Mozilla.</p>
<p>We hereby invite researchers, developers and designers of voice interfaces to speak to us and help inform the study. You may contact Shweta Mohandas at shweta@cis-india.org.</p>
<p><em>- Shweta Mohandas, Saumyaa Naidu, Puthiya Purayil Sneha, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay (project team)</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/raw/making-voices-heard-project-announcement'>https://cis-india.org/raw/making-voices-heard-project-announcement</a>
</p>
No publishershwetaVoice User InterfaceLanguagePrivacyAccessibilityResearchVoice Assisted InterfaceFeaturedResearchers at WorkMaking Voices Heard2019-12-18T12:10:05ZBlog EntryGirls in ICT Day
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/events/girls-in-ict-day
<b>The Centre for Internet and Society and Mitra Jyothi is glad to invite you to celebrate Girls in ICT day on April 25, 2013 at the Mitra Jyothi auditorium in Bangalore. Dr. U.B. Pavanaja will give a talk on Social Media and Kannada Language for Women with Disabilities. The event will begin at 2 p.m. and end at 5 p.m.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Celebrated on the 4th Thursday of April every year, International Girls’ in ICT Day is an initiative backed by ITU Member States in ITU Plenipotentiary Resolution 70 (Guadalajara, 2010) to create a global environment that empowers and encourages girls and young women to consider careers in the growing field of information and communication technologies (ICTs).</p>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">About the Speaker</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/about/people/our-team" class="external-link">Dr. U.B. Pavanaja</a> holds a Master’s degree from Mysore University and Ph.D. from Mumbai University. He has vast experience and has dedicated himself fully for the cause of Computer and Indian languages. He is one of the oldest editors of Kannada Wikipedia.</p>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/girls-in-ict-event-invite.pdf" class="internal-link">Click to download the invite</a> (PDF, 118 Kb)</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/events/girls-in-ict-day'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/events/girls-in-ict-day</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaAccessibilityEvent2013-04-22T11:15:57ZEventJammu & Kashmir (Govt) Notifications
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/resources/jammu-kashmir-notifications
<b>List of notifications published by the government of Jammu and Kashmir can be downloaded below:</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The zip folder (PDF and Word) contain the following:</p>
<ol style="text-align: justify; ">
<li>Reservation for Disabled/Handicapped in Government Services</li>
<li>The Jammu & Kashmir Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Rules, 2003</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The Jammu & Kashmir Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1998</li>
</ol>
<ul>
<li>PDF</li>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/jammu-and-kashmir-notifications.zip" class="internal-link">Word</a></li>
</ul>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/resources/jammu-kashmir-notifications'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/resources/jammu-kashmir-notifications</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaAccessibility2013-07-23T15:02:03ZPageJuly 2013 Bulletin
https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2013-bulletin
<b>Our newsletter for the month of July 2013 can be accessed below. </b>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) welcomes you to the seventh issue of its newsletter for the year 2013. In this issue we bring you <a href="https://cis-india.org/telecom/knowledge-repository-on-internet-access/institute-on-internet-and-society-event-report">a report on the Institute on Internet and Society</a> held in the month of June, <a href="https://cis-india.org/a2k/blog/comments-on-draft-guidelines-for-computer-related-inventions">comments submitted</a> by us to the Office of the Controller General of Patents Designs and Trademarks on the draft guidelines on computer related inventions, <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/report-on-the-5th-privacy-round-table">report from the fifth privacy roundtable meeting</a> held in Kolkata, updates from Kannada Wikipedia workshops held in <a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/blog/kannada-wikipedia-workshop-at-hubli">Hubli</a> and <a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/kannada-wiki-workshop-at-sagara">Sagara</a>, a <a href="https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/digital-humanities-for-indian-higher-education">report on Digital Humanities for higher education</a>, media coverage, and information on our forthcoming events.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Archives of our newsletters are <a href="https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/">here</a>. Our policies on Ethical Research Guidelines, Non-Discrimination and Equal Opportunities, Privacy, Terms of Website Use and Travel can be<a href="https://cis-india.org/about/policies"> accessed here</a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Jobs</b><br /> CIS is inviting applications for the posts of <a href="https://cis-india.org/jobs/vacancy-for-developer">Developer</a> (NVDA Screen Reader Project). To apply for this post, send in your resume to Nirmita Narasimhan (<a href="mailto:nirmita@cis-india.org">nirmita@cis-india.org</a>). CIS is also seeking applications for the post of <a href="https://cis-india.org/jobs/policy-associate-internet-governance">Policy Associate</a> (Internet Governance). To apply send your resume to Sunil Abraham (<a href="mailto:sunil@cis-india.org">sunil@cis-india.org</a>) and Pranesh Prakash (<a href="mailto:pranesh@cis-india.org">pranesh@cis-india.org</a>).</p>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility">Accessibility</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">CIS is doing two projects in partnership with the <b>Hans Foundation</b>. One is to create a national resource kit of state-wise laws, policies and programmes on issues relating to persons with disabilities in India and another for developing a screen reader and text-to- speech synthesizer for Indian languages:</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>National Resource Kit for Persons with Disabilities</b><br />CIS and the Centre for Law and Policy Research (CLPR) are working in this project. Draft chapters have been published. Feedback and comments are invited from readers for the chapters on Punjab, Uttarakhand, Maharashtra and Chandigarh:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-punjab-chapter-call-for-comments">The Punjab Chapter</a> (by Anandhi Viswanathan, July 31, 2013).</li>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-uttarakhand-chapter-call-for-comments">The Uttarakhand Chapter</a> (by Anandhi Viswanathan, July 31, 2013).</li>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-chandigarh-chapter-call-for-comments">The Chandigarh Chapter</a> (by CLPR, July 31, 2013).</li>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/national-resource-kit-maharashtra-chapter-call-for-comments">The Maharashtra Chapter</a> (by Anandhi Viswanathan, July 31, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p>Note: <i>All the chapters published on the website are early drafts and will be reviewed and updated</i>.</p>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/about/a2k">Access to Knowledge</a> and <a href="https://cis-india.org/openness">Openness</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Wikimedia Foundation has given a <a href="https://cis-india.org/a2k/access-to-knowledge-program-plan">grant</a> to CIS to support and develop the growth of Indic language communities and projects by community collaborations and partnerships. This is being carried out by the Access to Knowledge team based in Delhi. CIS is also doing a project (Pervasive Technologies) on examining the relationship between production of pervasive technologies and intellectual property. CIS also promotes openness including open government data, open standards, open access, and free/libre/open source software through its Openness programme.</p>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/a2k"><b>Access to Knowledge</b></a><b> </b>(Previously IP Reforms)</h3>
<p><b>Comments </b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/a2k/blog/comments-on-draft-guidelines-for-computer-related-inventions">Comments on the Draft Guidelines for Computer Related Inventions</a> (by Puneeth Nagaraj, July 31, 2013). The comments were submitted to the office of the Controller General of Patents Designs & Trademarks, Mumbai on July 26, 2013.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Event Participated</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/a2k/blog/the-assocham-international-conference-on-the-interface-between-intellectual-property-and-competition-law">An International Conference on Interface between Intellectual Property and Competition Law</a> (organized by ASSOCHAM, July 12, 2013). Nehaa Chaudhari participated in the conference and shares select notes in a blog post.</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Access to Knowledge (Wikipedia)</b><br />The <a href="http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Access_To_Knowledge/Team" title="Access To Knowledge/Team">A2K team</a> consists of three members based in Bangalore: <a href="https://cis-india.org/about/people/our-team">T. Vishnu Vardhan</a>, <a href="https://cis-india.org/about/people/our-team">Dr. U.B. Pavanaja</a> and <a href="https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/people/our-team">Subhashish Panigrahi</a> and one team member <a href="https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/people/our-team">Nitika Tandon</a> who is working from Delhi office.</p>
<p><b>Event Organised</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/blog/kannada-wikipedia-workshop-at-hubli">A Kannada Wikipedia Workshop</a> (organized by CIS-A2K team, July 21, 2013, Hubli). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja gave training to the participants on Wikipedia. Leading newspapers like the Times of India, Vijaya Karnataka, Deccan Herald, VijayaVani, Prajavani, Samyukta Karnataka and HosaDiganta covered the event. Scanned versions of the published articles can be <a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/blog/hubli-workshop-press-coverage.zip">viewed here</a>.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/kannada-wiki-workshop-at-sagara">A Kannada Wikipedia Workshop at Sagara</a> (organized by CIS-A2K team, Sagara, July 28, 2013). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja gave a talk on Wikipedia and Kannada Wikipedia.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Event Co-organised</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/blog/telegu-wiki-academy-at-centre-for-good-governance">Telugu Wiki Academy at Centre for Good Governance</a> (organized by CIS-A2K and Telegu Wikipedia Community, Centre for Good Governance, Jubilee Hills, Hyderabad, April 9, 2013). T. Vishnu Vardhan participated in this event.</li>
</ul>
<p><i>Note: The event was organized in April but report got published only in July</i>.</p>
<p><b>Event Participated</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/free-software">Free Software</a> (organized by Free Software Movement of Karnataka in partnership with Jnana Vikas Institute of Technology, Bidadi, July 24, 2013). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja made a presentation on Wikipedia.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Ongoing Event</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/hindu-r-krishna-kumar-august-2-2013-stress-on-posting-articles-on-kannada-wikipedia">A Workshop on Posting Articles in Kannada on Wikipedia</a> (organised by the Centre for Proficiency Development Placement Service, University of Mysore, CPDPS premises, Manasagangotri, August 6, 2013). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja is conducting a workshop. The <a href="http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-karnataka/stress-on-posting-articles-on-kannada-wikipedia/article4980552.ece">announcement was made in an article</a> by R. Krishna Kumar in the Hindu on August 2, 2013.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Press Coverage</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/oheraldo-july-27-2013-diana-fernandes-konkani-wikipedia-next">Konkani Wikipedia next?</a> (by Diana Fernandes, OHeralO, July 27, 2013). T. Vishnu Vardhan is quoted.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Openness</h3>
<p><b>Events Organised </b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/digital-activism-in-europe">Delhi: Digital Activism in Europe</a> (The Sarai Programme, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi, July 8, 2013). Bernadette Längle gave a talk about the hacker scene and digital activism in Europe, with a focus on the <a href="http://ccc.de/en">Chaos Computer Club</a>.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/open-hardware-lab">Open Hardware Lab: Play & Invent + Bonus Film Screening</a> (CIS, Bangalore, August 4, 2013). There was a film screening of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theremin:_An_Electronic_Odyssey">Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey</a> at the event.</li>
</ul>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/about/internet-governance">Internet Governance</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">CIS began two projects earlier this year. The first one on facilitating research and events on surveillance and freedom of expression is with Privacy International and support from the International Development Research Centre, Canada. The second one on mapping cyber security actors in South Asia and South East Asia is with the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto and support from the International Development Research Centre, Canada:<b> </b></p>
<p><b><span>SAFEGUARDS Project</span><br />Events Organised</b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/events/cryptoparty-delhi">Delhi: Learn to Secure Your Online Communication</a>! (IIC, DU Campus, Delhi, July 6, 2013). A cryptoparty was held in Delhi. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="http://www.cryptoparty.in/dharamsala">Dharamsala: Learn to Secure Your Online Communication</a>! (Dharamsala, July 13, 2013). A cryptoparty was held in Dharamsala. This was also covered in an article published in <a href="https://cis-india.org/news/caravan-magazine-august-1-2013-rahul-m-crypto-night">the Caravan</a> on August 1, 2013.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/report-on-the-5th-privacy-round-table">Privacy Roundtable Meeting</a> (co-organized by CIS, DSCI, and FICCI, Kolkata, July 13, 2013). An event report was written by Maria Xynou. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/the-hackers-way-of-reshaping-policies">The Hackers Way of Reshaping Policies</a> (CIS, Bangalore, August 2, 2012). Bernadette Langle gave a talk on privacy.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Events Participated In</b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/biometrics-or-bust-indias-identity-crisis">Biometrics or bust? India's Identity Crisis</a> (organised by the Oxford Internet Institute, Oxford University Press, July 2, 2013). Malavika Jayaram participated as a speaker on UID and Privacy.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/dsci-bpm-2013-conference-notes">DSCI Best Practices Meet 2013</a> (organized by DSCI, Anna Salai, Chennai, July 12, 2013). Kovey Coles attended the meeting.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/cii-conference-on-act">Achieve Cyber Security Together</a> (organized by the Confederation of Indian Industries, Chennai, July 13, 2013). Kovey Coles attended this event.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Ongoing / Upcoming Events</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/events/the-phishing-society-a-talk-by-maria-xynou">The Phishing Society: Why 'Facebook' is more dangerous than the Government Spying on You - A Talk by Maria Xynou</a> (CIS, Bangalore, August 7, 2013). Maria Xynou will give a talk on phishing society.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/cryptoparty-chennai">Learn to Protect your Online Activities!</a> (ACJ - Asian College of Journalism, Second Main Road (Behind M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation), Taramani, Chennai, August 7, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/events/privacy-meeting-brussels-bangalore">Privacy Meeting: Brussels – Bangalore</a> (CIS, Bangalore, August 14, 2013). Gertjan Boulet and Dariusz Kloza will give a talk on privacy.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/events/privacy-round-table-delhi">Privacy Round Table, New Delhi</a> (co-organised with FICCI and DSCI, FICCI, Federation House, Tansen Marg, New Delhi, August 24, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Columns</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/nytimes-july-10-2013-pranesh-prakash-how-surveillance-works-in-india">How Surveillance Works in India</a> (by Pranesh Prakash, New York Times, July 10, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/new-york-times-july-11-2013-can-india-trust-its-government-on-piracy">Can India Trust Its Government on Privacy?</a> (by Pranesh Prakash, New York Times, July 11, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/the-hoot-july-13-2013-chinmayi-arun-parsing-the-cyber-security-policy">Parsing the Cyber Security Policy</a> (by Chinmayi Arun, <a href="http://www.thehoot.org/web/Parsing-the-cyber-security-policy/6899-1-1-19-true.html">The Hoot</a>, and cross-posted in <a href="http://thefsiindia.wordpress.com/2013/07/13/indias-national-cyber-security-policy-preliminary-comments/">Free Speech Initiative</a>, July 13, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p><b>Blog Entries</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/the-difficult-balance-of-transparent-surveillance">The Difficult Balance of Transparent Surveillance</a> (by Kovey Coles, July 10, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/moving-towards-surveillance-state">Moving Towards a Surveillance State</a> (by Srinivas Atreya, July 15, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/more-than-hundred-global-groups-make-principled-stand-against-surveillance">More than a Hundred Global Groups Make a Principled Stand against Surveillance</a> (by Elonnai Hickok, July 31, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/the-audacious-right-to-be-forgotten">The Audacious ‘Right to Be Forgotten’</a> (by Kovey Coles, July 31, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Interview</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/interview-with-finnish-data-protection-ombudsman">An Interview with Reijo Aarnio</a>: Maria Xynou conducted an interview with Reijo, the Finnish Data Protection Ombudsman.</li>
</ul>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p><b>Media Coverage</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/economic-times-july-30-2013-indu-nandakumar-google-brings-tabs-to-sneak-advertisements-into-your-inbox">Google brings tabs to sneak advertisements into your inbox</a> (by Indu Nandakumar, Economic Times, July 30, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/livemint-leslie-d-monte-joji-thomas-philip-july-3-2013-how-the-worlds-largest-democracy-is-preparing-to-snoop-on-its-citizens">How the world’s largest democracy is preparing to snoop on its citizens</a> (by Leslie D' Monte and Joji Thomas Philip, July 3, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/report-dna-july-7-2013-joanna-lobo-geeks-have-a-solution-to-digital-surveillance-in-india-cryptography">Geeks have a solution to digital surveillance in India: Cryptography</a> (by Joanna Lobo, DNA, July 7, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/theregister-uk-phil-muncaster-july-9-2013-indias-centralised-snooping-system-facing-big-delays">India's centralised snooping system facing big delays</a> (by Phil Muncaster, The Register, July 9, 2013). CIS is mentioned in this article.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/firstpost-danish-raza-july-10-2013-indias-central-monitoring-system-security-cant-come-at-cost-of-privacy">India’s Central Monitoring System: Security can’t come at cost of privacy</a> (by Danish Raza, FirstPost, July 10, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/forbesindia-article-real-issue-july9-2013-rohin-dharmakumar-is-cms-a-compromise-of-your-security">Is CMS a Compromise of Your Security?</a> (by Rohin Dharmakumar, Forbes India magazine, July 12, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/firstpost-pierre-fitter-july-17-2013-snooping-technology">Snooping technology: Will CMS work in India?</a> (by Pierre Fitter, FirstPost, July 17, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/bbc-uk-july-18-2013-parul-aggarwal-social-media-monitoring">सावधान आपके प्रोफ़ाइल पर है पुलिस की नज़र!</a> (by Parul Aggarwal, BBC, July 18, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/dna-july-21-2013-shikha-kumar-your-life-is-an-open-facebook">Your life's an open Facebook</a> (by Shikha Kumar, DNA, July 21, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/hindustan-times-aloke-tikku-june-28-2013-concerns-over-central-snoop">Concerns over central snoop</a> (by Aloke Tikku, Hindustan Times, June 28, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/livemint-july-30-2013-joji-thomas-philip-leslie-d-monte-shauvik-ghosh-your-telco-could-help-spy-on-you">Your telco could help spy on you</a> (by Joji Thomas Philip, Leslie D'Monte and Shauvik Ghosh, LiveMint, July 30, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.</li>
</ul>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>DNA Profiling Bill</b><br />A sub-committee has been constituted as per the recommendations of the Expert Committee of DNA Profiling Bill. The sub-committee will have a meeting in Hyderabad on August 6, 2013. <a href="https://cis-india.org/news/meeting-of-sub-committee-on-dna-profiling-bill">Sunil Abraham is one of the members of the sub-committee</a>.</p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><span><b>Cyber Stewards Project</b><br /></span>Laird Brown, a strategic planner and writer with core competencies on brand analysis, public relations and resource management and Purba Sarkar who in the past worked as a strategic advisor in the field of SAP Retail are working in this project.</p>
<p>Video Interviews</p>
<ul>
<li>Part 3: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-3-eva-galperin">Interview with Eva Galperin</a> (July 10, 2013).</li>
<li>Part 4: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-4-marietje-schaake">Interview with Marietje Schaake</a> (July 11, 2013).</li>
<li>Part 5: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-5-amelia-andersdotter">Interview with Amelia Andersdotter</a> (July 12, 2013).</li>
<li>Part 6: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-6-lhadon-tethong">Interview with Lhadon Tethong</a> (July 15, 2013).</li>
<li>Part 7: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-7-jochem-de-groot">Interview with Jochem de Groot</a> (July 18, 2013).</li>
<li>Part 8: <a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/cis-cybersecurity-series-part-8-jeff-moss">Interview with Jeff Moss</a> (July, 23, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><span><b>Cyber Security</b></span><br /><b>Blog Entries </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/indias-national-cyber-security-policy-in-review">India's National Cyber Security Policy in Review</a> (by Jonathan Diamond, July 31, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/guidelines-for-protection-of-national-critical-information-infrastructure">Guidelines for the Protection of National Critical Information Infrastructure: How Much Regulation?</a> (by Jonathan Diamond, July 31, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Free Speech, Expression and Censorship</b><br />Column</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/down-to-earth-july-17-2013-nishant-shah-you-have-the-right-to-remain-silent">You Have the Right to Remain Silent</a> (by Nishant Shah, July 22, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Event Participated In </b></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/citizenlab-summer-institute-on-monitoring-internet-openness-and-rights">Connaught Summer Institute on Monitoring Internet Openness and Rights</a> (organized by the Munk School of Global Affairs, Bloor Street West, July 23, 2013). Malavika Jayaram participated in this event and spoke on "<a href="https://citizenlab.org/summerinstitute/abstracts.html#jayaram">India's Civil Liberties Crisis: Digital Free Will in Free Fall</a>".</li>
</ul>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/telecom/knowledge-repository-on-internet-access">Knowledge Repository on Internet Access</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">CIS in partnership with the Ford Foundation is executing a project to create a knowledge repository on Internet and society. This repository will comprise content targeted primarily at civil society with a view to enabling their informed participation in the Indian Internet and ICT policy space. The repository is available at <a href="http://www.internet-institute.in">www.internet-institute.in</a>.</p>
<p><b>Event Organised</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/telecom/knowledge-repository-on-internet-access/institute-on-internet-and-society-event-report">Institute on Internet and Society: Event Report</a> (supported by Ford Foundation, Golden Palms Resort, Bangalore, June 8 – 14, 2013). Pranesh Prakash, Bernadette Längle, Vir Kamal Chopra, AK Bhargava, Ananth Guruswamy, Archana Gulati, Chakshu Roy, Elonnai Hickok, Gaurab Raj Upadhaya, Helani Galpaya, Michael Ginguld, Dr. Nadeem Akhtar, C. Nandini, Dr. Nirmita Narasimhan, Dr. Nishant Shah, Parminder Jeet Singh, Ravikiran Annaswamy, Dr. Ravina Aggarwal, Satyen Gupta, Dr. Subbiah Arunachalam, Sunil Abraham, Tulika Pandey and T. Vishnu Vardhan were speakers at the event. The presentations and videos can now be accessed in this report.</li>
</ul>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/about/telecom">Telecom</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:</p>
<p><b>Newspaper Column</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/telecom/blog/business-standard-op-ed-shyam-ponappa-july-3-2013-building-up-vs-tearing-down">Building Up vs Tearing Down</a> (by Shyam Ponappa, July 3, 2013, originally published in the Business Standard, and also mirrored in Organizing India Blogspot).</li>
</ul>
<h3><a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities">Digital Humanities</a></h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">We are building research clusters in the field of Digital Humanities. The Digital will be used as a way of unpacking the debates in humanities and social sciences and look at the new frameworks, concepts and ideas that emerge in our engagement with the digital. The clusters aim to produce and document new conversations and debates that shape the contours of Digital Humanities in Asia.</p>
<p><b>Event Co-organised</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/digital-humanities-for-indian-higher-education">Digital Humanities for Indian Higher Education</a> (co-organised by HEIRA, CSCS, Tumkur University, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai and CIS, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, July 13, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Event Organised</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/digital-humanities-talk-at-cis">Digital Humanities Talk</a> (CIS, Bangalore, July 31, 2013). Sara Morais gave a talk on the advantages and problems in doing digital humanities work.</li>
</ul>
<p><b>Event Participated In<br /></b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/news/iippee-july-8-2013-fourth-annual-conference-in-political-economy">Political Economy, Activism and Alternative Economic Strategies</a> (organized by the International Institute of Social Studies, Erasmus University of Rotterdam, The Hague, July 9 – 13, 2013). Nishant Shah presented his paper on paper on <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/dech.12036/full">Citizen Action in the Time of Network.</a></li>
</ul>
<p><b>Blog Entries</b></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<ul>
<b> </b>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/designing-change-gatekeepers-in-digital-humanities">Designing Change? Gatekeepers in Digital Humanities</a> (by Sara Morais, July 2, 2013).</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-humanities/towards-critical-tool-building">Towards Critical Tool-building</a> (by Sara Morais, July 12, 2013).</li>
</ul>
<h2><a href="http://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/">About CIS</a></h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Centre for Internet and Society is a non-profit research organization that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression, privacy, accessibility for persons with disabilities, access to knowledge and IPR reform, and openness (including open government, FOSS, open standards, etc.), and engages in academic research on digital natives and digital humanities.</p>
<p>Follow us elsewhere</p>
<ul>
<li>Get short, timely messages from us on <a href="https://twitter.com/cis_india">Twitter</a></li>
<li>Join the CIS group on <a href="http://www.facebook.com/groups/28535315687/">Facebook</a></li>
<li>Visit us at <a href="https://cis-india.org/">http://cis-india.org</a></li>
</ul>
<p>Support Us<br />Please help us defend consumer / citizen rights on the Internet! Write a cheque in favour of ‘The Centre for Internet and Society’ and mail it to us at No. 194, 2nd ‘C’ Cross, Domlur, 2nd Stage, Bengaluru – 5600 71.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Request for Collaboration<br />We invite researchers, practitioners, and theoreticians, both organisationally and as individuals, to collaboratively engage with Internet and society and improve our understanding of this new field. To discuss the research collaborations, write to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, at <a href="mailto:sunil@cis-india.org">sunil@cis-india.org</a> or Nishant Shah, Director – Research, at <a href="mailto:nishant@cis-india.org">nishant@cis-india.org</a></p>
<p><i>CIS is grateful to its donors, Wikimedia Foundation, Ford Foundation, Privacy International, UK, Hans Foundation and the Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.</i></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2013-bulletin'>https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2013-bulletin</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaAccess to KnowledgeTelecomAccessibilityInternet GovernanceDigital HumanitiesOpenness2013-08-21T09:30:32ZPageMaking Voices Heard
https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/making-voices-heard
<b>We are happy to announce the launch of our final report on the study ‘Making Voices Heard: Privacy, Inclusivity, and Accessibility of Voice Interfaces in India. The study was undertaken with support from the Mozilla Corporation.</b>
<p style="text-align: center; "><img src="https://cis-india.org/home-images/WebsiteHeader.jpg/@@images/8d8ed2a0-f0e4-44d7-8938-493b186402c5.jpeg" alt="Making Voices Heard" class="image-inline" title="Making Voices Heard" /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">We believe that voice interfaces have the potential to democratise the use of the internet by addressing limitations related to reading and writing on digital text-only platforms and devices. This report examines the current landscape of voice interfaces in India, with a focus on concerns related to privacy and data protection, linguistic barriers, and accessibility for persons with disabilities (PwDs).</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The report features a visual mapping of 23 voice interfaces and technologies publicly available in India, along with a literature survey, a policy brief towards development and use of voice interfaces and a design brief documenting best practices and users’ needs, both with a focus on privacy, languages, and accessibility considerations, and a set of case studies on three voice technology platforms. <span>Read and download the full report <a class="external-link" href="http://voice.cis-india.org/">here</a></span></p>
<hr />
<h3>Credits</h3>
<p><strong>Research</strong>: Shweta Mohandas, Saumyaa Naidu, Deepika Nandagudi Srinivasa, Divya Pinheiro, and Sweta Bisht.</p>
<p><strong>Conceptualisation, Planning, and Research Inputs</strong>: Sumandro Chattapadhyay, and Puthiya Purayil Sneha.</p>
<p><strong>Illustration</strong>: Kruthika NS (Instagram @theworkplacedoodler). Website Design Saumyaa Naidu. Website Development Sumandro Chattapadhyay, and Pranav M Bidare.</p>
<p><strong>Review and Editing</strong>: Puthiya Purayil Sneha, Divyank Katira, Pranav M Bidare, Torsha Sarkar, Pallavi Bedi, and Divya Pinheiro.</p>
<p><strong>Copy Editing</strong>: The Clean Copy</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/making-voices-heard'>https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/making-voices-heard</a>
</p>
No publishershwetaVoice User InterfacePrivacyAccessibilityInternet GovernanceResearchFeaturedHomepage2022-06-27T16:18:36ZBlog EntryInclusive Financial Services
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services.pdf
<b></b>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services.pdf'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services.pdf</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaAccessibility2015-05-03T01:55:21ZFileInclusive Financial Services - Global Trends in Accessibility Requirements
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services-global-trends-in-accessibility-requirements
<b>Inclusive Financial Services is a G3ict White Paper researched in cooperation with the Centre for Internet and Society. The research paper comprises a Foreword and Introduction, four chapters — Barriers to Access for Persons with Disabilities and Diverse Abilities, International Framework, Integrating Accessibility into the System, and State of Practice - Impact of the Convention on Inclusive Finance and Accessibility Efforts around the Globe.</b>
<h2>Foreword</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Global demand for accessibility continues to grow, due in part to the strengthening voice worldwide of more than one billion people with disabilities, including the aging population, and important frameworks, such as the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. From a private sector standpoint, the Convention represents a unique opportunity to ensure equal access to information while achieving global harmonization of standards and economies of scale. Understanding that technology is the great equalizer for underserved populations and having a clear roadmap towards inclusive information and communications technologies (ICT), rather than simple compliance strategies, will benefit everyone in every industry.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Specifically, the financial services sector is faced with the need to transform operations while providing truly exceptional customer experiences. Disruptive trends -- such as the aging population, influx of mobile devices and global regulations – are driving demand for more human-centric technology, and creating an opportunity for innovation that are proving to be differentiators for the institutions embracing them. Consumer demand to be in control of interactions and information is forcing those in financial services to reconsider what’s important to stay competitive. By offering an online experience through any device personalized to individual needs, preferences and abilities, organizations can ensure they are reaching the broadest base of the population, especially the “unbanked” and “underbanked,” to enhance interactions and improve sales opportunities.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Customers with lifelong disabilities or age-related impairments represent an increasingly large population among the biggest markets in the world such as OECD countries and China. Also, in many countries aging persons are the holders of a majority of the assets and highly dependent on insurance, retirement and banking services. Ensuring they can use the services they need without encountering accessibility barriers is a powerful way to earn their loyalty in a highly competitive environment.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">IBM has a long tradition and culture of accessibility and understands the importance of improving the user experience, managing accessibility compliance, and creating an inclusive workplace environment. Consistent with our own experience, this report highlights the organizational and process adjustments needed to ensure everyone has equal access to timely information they need for work and life.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">By creating a holistic strategy for embedding accessible technology across the entire enterprise - from processes to product development to people – organizations can reinvigorate individual channels and harmonize them across the bank. G3ict has written this timely publication for the financial services sector that provides a clear picture of the global forces at work that are transforming how employee- and client-facing applications, products and services are delivered to reach the broadest set of customers. The report also serves as a useful benchmarking source for governments and advocates based on its review of existing solutions already implemented around the world. We applaud G3ict for taking this first step on the road of advocating for greater accessibility of financial services in cooperation with stakeholders from around the world.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Ian Hurst, General Manager, Global Financial Services Sector, IBM Corporation<br />Frances W. West, Chief Accessibility Officer, IBM Corporation</p>
<hr />
<h2 style="text-align: justify; ">Introduction</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Financial services play a necessary and important role in societies by enabling access to products, resources, and services, enabling savings and asset creation, and facilitating economic self-sufficiency. Access to financial services for all is a necessity in today’s world not simply at the community or household level, but at an individual level, to open doors to banking services, credit services, stocks and shares, insurance, and other markets. Access to and inclusion in financial services is crucial to poverty reduction and participation in economic prosperity and growth and development.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The increasing pervasiveness of technology in the delivery of financial services and the disruption of traditional channels of delivery through ‘FinTech’ (technology for financial service delivery) have generated new enthusiasm and newer ways for reaching out to persons who remain unbanked. Similarly, the increasing nature of services now available through technology has triggered growing demand among persons who remained marginalized from traditional paper-based banking services, as well as calls to ensure that they do not in turn create new barriers to access. Accompanying this growth spurt in technology there has also been an increasing recognition of the rights of persons with disabilities and the utmost importance of providing equal access to them to all services, including financial services.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Persons with disabilities and diverse abilities have been amongst those traditionally marginalized from the financial services sector through a mix of inaccessibility, presumptions of limited need and capacity to manage finances, and mindsets that did not view them as a profitable consumer base. This paradigm is now rapidly changing with growing evidence of their demand and need for access to services as well as the increasing income base of persons with disabilities around the world. Persons with disabilities and diverse abilities are demanding better and easier access to the entire range of financial services. Access to and inclusion in financial services is important to persons across the economic spectrum. And for persons with disabilities who live under the poverty line, it is essential that they are involved in financial inclusion initiatives and programs that will empower them and enable them to become financially independent.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">A range of factors are serving as drivers to enhance the inclusion of persons with disabilities and diverse abilities through accessible financial services including demographics, attaining a competitive advantage and improving market share nationally and globally, Corporate Social Responsibility, regulations, legislation and compliance, enhancing business value, ensuring and increasing an inclusive workplace for employees with disabilities, maximizing on technology advances, and ensuring diversity and inclusion for all.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">This report offers an introduction and overview to the need for, and mechanisms to achieve accessibility in financial services:</p>
<ul style="text-align: justify; ">
<li>Chapter 1 offers an understanding of the barriers posed by inaccessible financial services to persons with different disabilities.</li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: justify; ">
<li>Chapter 2 highlights the different international mandates and frameworks that are accelerating the promotion of financial inclusion for persons with disabilities.</li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: justify; ">
<li>Chapter 3 offers in-depth descriptions of the accessibility needs based on the type of technology in use, along with examples of effective practices and solutions to promote inclusion. It also offers a look at how different countries are striving to achieve the accessibility mandate.</li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: justify; ">
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Chapter 4 focuses on the state of practice of financial inclusion for persons with disabilities across countries and the implementation of the Convention’s requirements for ICT accessibility and financial inclusion. This chapter describes findings from two major studies undertaken by G3ict that paint a picture of the state of financial accessibility today and offer a glimpse into the financial sector’s commitment to incorporate accessibility into their work and services in the future.</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Finally, in the Conclusions section, the report offers recommendations for relevant stakeholders to incorporate the principles of inclusion to drive accessibility through product design and delivery, policy and legal structures, and distribution channels and pathways.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services.pdf" class="internal-link"><b>Download the report</b></a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services-global-trends-in-accessibility-requirements'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/inclusive-financial-services-global-trends-in-accessibility-requirements</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaFeaturedHomepageAccessibility2015-05-03T06:55:49ZBlog EntryComments to the GIGW
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/comments-to-gigw
<b>The Centre for Internet and Society submitted its comments to the National Informatics Centre on April 30, 2015. </b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">We the undersigned would like to commend the NIC for taking a leadership role in promoting eaccessibility through the notification of the Guidelines for Indian Government websites (GIGW) in 2009. Undoubtedly, web accessibility plays an ultimately crucial role in enabling and enhancing citizen participation and access to information. The development of assistive technologies both hardware and software has increased the potentiality of the constituency of persons with disabilities and elderly to become one of the largest consumer groups on the Internet. We use the word ‘potentiality’ because the current information ecosystem on the Internet, comprising information through text, electronic documents, audio, video and other multimedia presented through Indian websites are inaccessible for persons using screen readers and other technologies.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Despite the passage of 6 years since the GIGW, there has been negligible progress on the front for making Indian government websites conform to the notified standards. An evaluation of accessibility of government websites carried out in 2012<a href="#fn1" name="fr1">[1] </a>demonstrated that the majority yet remained inaccessible, with very slow improvement in the situation thereafter. Our interaction with government departments and government web developers revealed that there was still a relative lack of awareness of the need to conform to these guidelines coupled with an absolute lack of knowledge on how to implement them. Given this background, we submit our recommendations as below:</p>
<ol>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Mandatory: Since experience has demonstrated that voluntary compliance has not worked to bring about accessibility in government communication through the Internet, it is necessary that these guidelines be made mandatory with a strict deadline beyond which noncompliance becomes an offence, to ensure that it is taken seriously. This is now partly in place since the notification of the National Policy on Universal Electronic Accessibility<a href="#fn2" name="fr2">[2] </a>by the DEITy in Oct 2013. The legal mandate around this will only strengthen once the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Bill comes in force. Hence, the present recommendation.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">WCAG 2.0 level AA compliance: We recommend that WCAG 2.0 level AA be specified as the standard for minimum level of compliance in the guidelines. This is recommended for several reasons.<br />a. These are globally accepted standards which have been well researched<br />b. These have assigned success criteria for each guideline, which is not present in the current draft of guidelines, thus enabling a developer to know whether the criteria have been adequately met.<br />c. The task of review is a constant one which is being undertaken by experts around the world through various study groups and technical committees, which will ensure that updates are timely and keep abreast of new developments. Hence, the burden of review will not be upon us. At present, we also do not have the domain expertise on this subject which is available with W3C and elsewhere globally. Instead, efforts may be focused upon making any additions to the WCAG 2.0 which are required to make them more comprehensive in the Indian context.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Meeting success criteria: For each accessibility checkpoint / guideline, there should be defined success criteria to ensure that the implementation meets acceptable levels. There should be Objective measures in place to have technical validation of all the websites. There needs to be a process defined to validate all websites on WCAG accepted tools to ensure compliance to technical standards. The recommended procedure provided by the W3C for evaluating websites known as the Website Accessibility Conformance Evaluation Methodology 1.0<a href="#fn3" name="fr3">[3] </a>(WCAG-EM) may also be followed in this regard.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Onus of implementation: The onus of complying with the Guidelines must be placed on the top management in an organisation/ department/ ministry. Someone like a board member or other senior person.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Accessibility audit: There should be an accessibility audit after the development of a website by a 3rd party entity independent of the website developer and website owner.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Accessibility audit agency: There must be a provision to setup an entity which can perform access audit for all government websites. The agency may include government officials from various departments, ministries or autonomous bodies, leading accessibility firms and must include end users.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Content updation: To ensure the accessibility of new content that is added to a website on a regular basis, there should be a defined accessibility process so that an existing system that is accessible is not broken.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Clarity in the specifications: There should be clear guidelines to make it easy to comprehend for all and not just a technical person. At present, some of the guidelines are ambiguous and may not be easily discernible even to an experienced developer or website development agencies who are not domain experts. For example, guideline5 states: ‘Information structure and relationship is preserved in all presentation styles’. This guideline could be clearer if it specified that tabular information should be specified with table tags, labels should be marked with label tags, Headings should be marked with heading tags. Etc. This reiterates the earlier point that adherence to WCAG 2.0 is best since it provides developers with resources such as Understanding WCAG 2.0 and Techniques for WCAG 2.0 documents. Another example is guideline 19- ‘There is adequate contrast between text and background colour’. However, it is unclear as to what is meant by ‘adequate’. WCAG 2.0 on the other hand, specifies the contrast for each level. IT specifies acceptable colour combinations for background, foreground and text which increase accessibility.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Stress on implementation: A lot of attention should be given to implementing the guidelines. The fact that there has been minimal success in adoption of the guidelines makes out a clear case for a stronger awareness strategy and adoption action plan, with a dedicated team or department in place within NIC which can work towards supporting training and retrofitting efforts with different government departments and agencies around the country. This also calls for a two tier team approach, one at the central level, with contact points set up for each state which are responsible for this implementation, with the time limit for enforcement of these guidelines. For this purpose, partnerships may be sought with private players and organisations serving the disabled and accessibility experts.</li>
</ol>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">We are available to help this endeavour and are happy to provide support whether in the form of clarifications, feedback or any other manner. Our contact details are given at the end of this submission.</p>
<hr />
<p>[<a href="#fr1" name="fn1">1</a>]. Accessibility of Government Websites in India: A Report (by CIS and Hans Foundation): http://cisindia.org/accessibility/accessibility-of-government-websites-in-india</p>
<p>[<a href="#fr2" name="fn2">2</a>]. Available at http://www.ncert.nic.in/announcements/notices/pdf_files/Nationalpolicyonuniversal.pdf</p>
<p>[<a href="#fr3" name="fn3">3</a>]. Available at http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG-EEM/</p>
<p>Click to <a href="https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/comments-to-gigw.pdf" class="internal-link">download </a>the submission file.</p>
<ol> </ol>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/comments-to-gigw'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/comments-to-gigw</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaSubmissionsAccessibility2015-05-09T16:00:11ZBlog EntryReport on 15 days Training in Basic Computing with use of NVDA and eSpeak in Gujarati
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-gujarati
<b>This programme was aimed at high school students who were completely new to computers. The aim of the workshop was to empower the students to at least read and write using eSpeak Gujarati with NVDA within the 15 day duration.</b>
<p>Venue: Shree Navchetan Andhajan Mandal Madhapar - Kachchh.<br />Dates: April 2 to April 16, 2015<br />Trainer: Mahendra Chudasma.<br />Language: Gujarati<br />Number of Participants: 15</p>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Most of the participants achieved the target and were also able to manage simple tasks like opening and saving documents in Word and also had the opportunity of gaining knowledge of the use of Android phones. Our thanks to Mahendra for ensuring that the participants came out with flying colours at the end of the workshop.</p>
<p style="text-align: center; "><img src="https://cis-india.org/home-images/Gujarati.png" alt="Gujarati training" class="image-inline" title="Gujarati training" /></p>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Training Schedule</h3>
<p>April 2</p>
<ul>
<li>Introduction</li>
<li>Information about Computer and its Parts</li>
<li>Keyboard orientation. Function keys, alphabets keys and number keys and number pad</li>
<li>About desktop, start menu, notification and taskbar</li>
<li>2: how to press 2 keys windows plus M. and alt plus F4</li>
</ul>
<p>April 3</p>
<ul>
<li>How to start Microsoft Office and Word</li>
<li>How to type words and how to read it. And modify delete and add alphabets and word</li>
<li>Modify spellings</li>
</ul>
<p>April 4</p>
<ul>
<li>Practice on topics covered in the first two days</li>
<li>How to start narrator without screen reader and how to install screen reader</li>
<li>How to read NVDA's commands by its help</li>
</ul>
<p>April 5</p>
<ul>
<li>How to formatting file by title, bold, increase and decrees fonts, make underline and justified and save it</li>
<li>How to make folder on desktop and how to search and copy file in the documents and paste in folder</li>
</ul>
<p>April 8</p>
<ul>
<li>Information about notification</li>
<li>How to set clock by notification and control panel</li>
<li>Difference between file and folder</li>
<li>How to play song with media player, VLC and Winamp</li>
<li>How to search in file and folders in your computer</li>
<li>Run Windows</li>
</ul>
<p>April 9</p>
<ul>
<li>Internet's information</li>
<li>Internet short commands</li>
<li>Read news in English, Gujarati, and Hindi newspaper through online</li>
</ul>
<p>April 10</p>
<ul>
<li>How to short navigate in internet by h for heading, t for table, l for list and insert f7 for links</li>
<li>About check box, combo box, radio button and button</li>
<li>How to create mail, and read it and compose mail and send it. With bcc and cc</li>
</ul>
<p>April 11</p>
<ul>
<li>About job related sites and banks sites</li>
<li>Searching through Google</li>
</ul>
<p>April 12</p>
<ul>
<li>How to download</li>
<li>Some general questions on computer practice</li>
</ul>
<p>April 13</p>
<ul>
<li>Practice for last days and some questions answers</li>
<li>Information about some messengers Facebook and Skype with its demonstration</li>
<li>How to create account and how to use these</li>
</ul>
<p>April 14</p>
<ul>
<li>Practice of old topics</li>
<li>Information about scanner with its demonstration</li>
<li>And demonstration with EnAble India EYE Tool and EnAble India Spelling Tool</li>
</ul>
<p>April 15</p>
<ul>
<li>Revision for complete course of NVDA of 15 days</li>
</ul>
<p>April 16</p>
<ul>
<li>Information about Android on students demand</li>
</ul>
<h2>
<hr />
List of Students for Gujarati Training</h2>
<ol>
<li>Garva Ajay Valjibhai</li>
<li>Chauhan Jayendrasinh Popatsinh</li>
<li>Meriya Pravin Karamshibhai</li>
<li>Gadhvi Hari Karsanbhai</li>
<li>Jat Razak Haronbhai</li>
<li>Koli Mavji Ramjibhai</li>
<li>Ganava Mital Panglabhai</li>
<li>Chawda Bharti Popatbhai</li>
<li>Maheswari Sunita Sumarbhai</li>
<li>Goyal Dipin Ravjibhai</li>
<li>Jeda Hisan Samirbhai</li>
<li>Patel Ritesh Bipinbhai</li>
<li>Raval Bhumi Nitinbhai</li>
<li>Mokariya Shardaben Girishbhai</li>
<li>Jain Alpaben Manojbhai</li>
</ol>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-gujarati'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-gujarati</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaAccessibility2015-05-10T11:23:42ZBlog EntryReport on Training in Basic Computing with use of eSpeak and NVDA in Oriya
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-espeak-nvda-odia
<b>This training was held at Orissa Association for the Blind at Bhubaneswar from February 8 to 10, 2015. Thirty six delegates attended the programme. </b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The highlight of the training was that we received an overwhelming response from the participants. The training had to be conducted in the main auditorium of the Orissa Association for the Blind, instead of the computer lab, which had only a capacity of seating 10 trainees. The participants acknowledged the importance of Oriya support for their career growth. There was a lot of excitement amongst the participants to know how to read and type in Oriya.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The eSpeak training was preceded by a Career Counseling Workshop, which highlighted the importance of Reading and Writing in the local vernacular language for a career growth. The main challenge faced during the training was that there was virtually no material available in Orriya on the internet in Unicode font, for the participants to practice reading. Hence the participants had to first learn typing and than create their own little lines to read.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The training was conducted by Ganshyam Mohante, who had also contributed as the tester for Oriya. The Inauguration was attended by the whole managing committee of Orissa Association for the Blind, who had specially assembled for the event.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Orissa Association for the Blind is also very keen on organizing the 15 day follow up programme, where in more persons will be trained in reading and writing in Oriya, along with the knowledge for using basic computers.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-espeak-nvda-odia'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-espeak-nvda-odia</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaNVDAAccessibilityE-Speak2015-06-03T01:24:53ZBlog EntryReport on Training in Basic Computing with use of NVDA at NAB, Delhi
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-nvda-at-delhi
<b>The objective of the workshop was to help the staff members understand NVDA and its functioning with the Indian languages so that they efficiently attend to the queries of the visitors and the callers at help desk.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Five staff members lead by Mr. Ajay Sharma, Project Manager of the technical unit at National Association for the Blind, R.K Puram, Delhi had attended a training workshop. Concepts related to the NVDA were discussed in the workshop. It was an interactive workshop. Ms. Suman Dogra had conducted the workshop. The staff members had certain doubts with NVDA, that were cleared. Some new information was imparted to the staff members. The help desk was made to understand the functioning of the language section of NVDA. This will help callers to configure their native language on their machines.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Some tips were given to the staff members on imparting training in NVDA in coming training modules at National Association for the Blind. Object navigation was explained to the computer instructors. The team at National Association for the Blind is informed that they can inform about any of the problem in NVDA to the Indian development team.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-nvda-at-delhi'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-nvda-at-delhi</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaAccessibility2015-06-04T01:19:28ZBlog EntryReport on Training in Basic Computing with use of NVDA and eSpeak in Tamil
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-in-tamil
<b>The training programme was conducted on January 27 and 28, 2015 at Karna Vidya Technology Centre, [KVTC] Guindy, Chennai. A total of 15 delegates attended the show.</b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">We are extremely grateful to Raghuram, Coordinator, KVTC and Shankar from Bookshare, Chennai for organizing the Tamil training within 48 hours of notice, as the said workshop was originally planned at NIVH, Chennai. Due to last minute widrawal of NIVH, Raghu and Shankar excepted the challenge of hosting the training.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The 15 participants mainly comprised of computer teachers and students pursuing higher studies. The Tamil reading and writing training was conducted by E. Sakthivel and S. Pandiyaraj.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The follow up 15 day training for Tamil will be conducted at Coimbatore and it will be conducted by the above mentioned trainers. The 15 day event will be planned by Shankar and Raghuraman.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The participants of the workshop were also shown the assistive devices and made aware about the ADIP scheme. KVTC has now started registering persons with Blindness for the ADIP scheme and shall send in their data to Saksham Delhi.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-in-tamil'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-e-speak-in-tamil</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaAccessibility2015-07-20T15:23:42ZBlog EntryReport on Training in Basic Computing with use of NVDA and eSpeak in Hindi
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-espeak-hindi
<b>The training programme was held on February 5 and 6, 2015 at National Association for the Blind in R.K. Puram, New Delhi. Fifteen delegates attended. </b>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The training at NAB at Delhi had representations from organizations serving the blind from all across Delhi. Those who took part were either Heads of IT Department or computer instructors. The aim of inviting the IT heads and computer instructors was to promote the use of NVDA in their training programmes and also facilitate the reading and writing in Hindi.<br /><br />The workshop at the Blind Relief Association was mainly attended by Special Educators for the Blind. The aim of promoting use of NVDA and knowledge of reading and writing in Hindi using eSpeak amongst these special educators was that these special educators would be working closely with the blind community. If the special educators are sensitized, the use of regional languages can be maximized.<br /><br /></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-espeak-hindi'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-training-in-basic-computing-with-use-of-nvda-espeak-hindi</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaAccessibility2015-06-04T01:58:34ZBlog EntryReport on eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA Training Workshop
https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-espeak-tamil-computing-with-nvda-training-workshop
<b>The training programme was held from May 25 to 29, 2015 at Differently Abled Children Section, District Central Library, Coimbatore. Twenty-one delegates attended.</b>
<h2 style="text-align: justify; ">Inauguration</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA Training workshop planned for 5 days (25<sup>th</sup> May 2015 to 29<sup>th</sup> May 2015) extensively for visually challenged school, college students and teachers was <b>inaugurated</b> on 25<sup>th</sup> May 2015 morning by Mr. J. Karthikeyan. District Library Officer, Coimbatore. Mr. S. Shankar Subbiah, Assistive Technology Consultant and representative of National Association for Blind, New Delhi and The Centre for Internet & Society, Bangalore, the sponsors of the workshop gave the Welcome talk. He also explained the purpose of the Workshop with the need for Tamil computing becoming necessity among the visually challenged in the present educational and employment context. It is most required with the Government distributing Cost Free Laptops preloaded with NVDA and the equipment and technology cost becoming Nil. The Librarian of the District Central Library gave the Vote of thanks, thanking the sponsors, the District Library Officer for the opportunity to train visually challenged members of the Library on Tamil with NVDA, and placed a request to include the staff of the Children's section as they would be able to train the school going Children further.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The well-equipped and accessible section of the District Central Library, Coimbatore served as the venue for training. In order to facilitate the participants with more concentrated and time efforts, High Tea and Lunch were also served for the Training days at the Centre. There were volunteers to assist the Trainees and they served enthusiastically. Many of the students used their Laptops and those who did not have a laptop were given access through the computers available in the section. The participant trainees numbering to 21 including the section staff were from Coimbatore district and nearby districts like Tiruppur, and Erode of Tamilnadu state.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The workshop began with Resource persons, Mr. S. Shankar Subbiah and Mr. R. Jaganathan, a low vision employee of the Library and a resource export continuing with the training activities on their expertise areas.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify; ">Activities conducted during the training period:</h2>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Day 1 - 25/05/2015</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Forenoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The whole group of Trainees were installed or updated with the latest versions of NVDA</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">A general overview on Operating System, Applications available in Windows, various File formats, Screen Readers and other Assistive Technology like OCR, Scan and Read applications available for Visually Challenged were dealt with</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The session was conducted in an interactive manner to understand and assess the computer skills of the participant trainees.</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Afternoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The major and sub menus of NVDA were explained to the trainees after few of them were new to that.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The Trainees were given hands on training by making them to change the settings, configurations by themselves and checking out the changes.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The trainees were given comprehensive passages to be read in NVDA to get accustomed to the voice modulation and asked questions based on it</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Day 2 - 26/05/2015</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Forenoon</p>
<ul>
<li>Tamil keyboard layout mapping of Microsoft Windows for default Unicode Tamil Font typing were introduced to the trainees by the Resource person.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The whole group of Trainees were trained to identify the keys for vowels and consonants of Tamil language, type and practice by themselves with the volunteers supporting them, when they had difficulties.</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Afternoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The Trainees were trained to identify the keys for combinations of vowels and combinations with two letter, three letter, four letter word units given for typing and practicing by themselves as they picked up faster.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>A play and learn session was organized to spell out connected words for typing practice.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>To make the training workshop more live, the participants also were requested and exhibited their Tamil native talents and knowledge.</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Day 3 - 27/05/2015</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Forenoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The Trainees were trained by giving large sets of five and bigger letter units of words to type and practice as a revision.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>It was followed up by smaller phrases and then sentences to be typed by the Trainees.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The trainees at this point of time, introduced short cuts for navigation within the text, spell check, cut, copy, paste commands</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Afternoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The trainees were made to listen to the Tamil text paragraphs with the help of NVDA screen-reader supported by eSpeak voice</li>
</ul>
<p><br />The trainees were suggested to type out the phrases listened on a separate document</p>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Day 4 - 28/05/2015</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Forenoon</p>
<ul>
<li>The trainees were introduced to toggle language between English and Tamil for bilingual content typing and practice.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The trainees were trained on file operations like simple formatting, folder creation, saving the file in Unicode format to required folder and retrieval of the particular file. Similarly, for navigating, opening the file saved and continuing editing.</li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Afternoon</p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">As a reinforcement on the learning process, a Quiz Programme was conducted to the Trainees on Microsoft Tamil layout and key strokes required for different Tamil words, phrases.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Introduction to HTML, various tags and formatting that can be done, Forms and fields, Email Clients and Browsers were given to the Trainees. Usage of Tamil in Internet, and the browsers supporting the Unicode formatted content and the NVDA development efforts to support Internet browsing was discussed.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The trainees were given HTML contents like Newspapers formatted to navigate and read for practice</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The students were given downloaded online application Forms (as Internet was restricted to few computers in the library) and explained form navigation. They were assessed for their short cut using</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: justify; ">Day 5 - 29/05/2015</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Forenoon</p>
<ul>
<li>Introduction on DAISY books and knowledge sharing on the available resources to read a DAISY book was done.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Demonstration on using Android based tablets and mobile phones to access the Tamil DAISY books given to the Trainees using Bookshare.org. The Trainees were also given information to subscribe for Bookshare membership and Book search and retrieval.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The trainees were also given information on different groups operating on Internet like Access India, Valluvan Paarvai online, the benefits and encouraged their participation for enriching their knowledge and practicing their language content writing, and development skills.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">The Guest also had an interactive session assessing the participants Tamil computing skills by questions and also introduced them to one another Tamil keyboard Layout 'Anthaga Kavi' developed by visually challenged community. He recommended them to try that after practicing the present learned Microsoft layout for more easier typing experience.</li>
</ul>
<h2 style="text-align: justify; ">The Valedictory Function</h2>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA Training workshop conducted for 5 days (25<sup>th</sup> May 2015 to 29<sup>th</sup> May 2015) had a brief Valedictory function presided by Mr. G. Venkateshan, State Bank of India Zonal Office, Coimbatore and an experienced visually challenged person on Tamil computing who delivered the valedictory address and stressed on Tamil computing skills necessity for higher education and employment opportunities. The District Library Officer, Mr. J. Karthikeyan also felicitated the gathering and distributed the Certificates to the participants. Vote of thanks to CIS, NAB and the organizers was given by Mr. Muthu Venkatasubramanian, Co-ordinator for the Differently Abled Children section and a visually challenged participant. The training felt much useful and requested to extend in batches for more persons ended up with the National Anthem and Lunch served for all.</p>
<h2 style="text-align: justify; ">Feedback</h2>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Mr. Ashok, a student of Final year graduation felt how easy it was to learn Tamil typing and he is looking forward to eagerly participate in groups and though he had subscribed to Bookshare, he had not read Tamil books. But, now he is confident to download and read Tamil content.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Mr. S. Sabareesh, Student from Loyola College, Chennai felt that his vacation to his native town gave him a good learning experience on Tamil computing and various other concepts, shortcuts for efficiently using NVDA.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Mr. Jeeyawolhok, a Government School Teacher present felt that now it is necessity of visually challenged persons to work with Computers even in the field of Teaching profession and this Training gave him more confident as being a Tamil teacher.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Ms. Loganayaki, an English Literature student felt that she did not think Tamil typing was so easy before and now would read large volume of e-contents of Tamil novels available in the Library as well as practice her Tamil writing skills on Computer.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify; ">Mrs. Saraswathi, the mother of Mr. Shankar, 10<sup>th</sup> Grade student and participant trainee gave a feedback that she was worried on how she had to read the whole Tamil books for her son. Reading it as e-content through NVDA and eSpeak voice becoming familiar to her son made her job easy. And, he could also practice and revise his lessons like any other child by typing the contents in Tamil as others do by writing. She thanked the organizers for the workshop and wanted one such run for school children with visual impairments from 8<sup>th</sup> standard onwards conducted by school or at least in the Library regularly. This would help them in their higher standards and education for being more independent and not to depend on readers for their academic requirements.</li>
</ul>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-espeak-tamil-computing-with-nvda-training-workshop'>https://cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/report-on-espeak-tamil-computing-with-nvda-training-workshop</a>
</p>
No publishernirmitaAccessibility2015-06-04T13:44:25ZBlog Entry