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Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) May 9th – let’s mark it

April 24th, 2013

Global Accessibility Awareness DayThanks to Jennison and Joe Devon, since 2012 world has marked May 9th as Global Accessibility Awareness Day and there were plenty of events took place last year across the world. This year too, there is a lot of momentum going on to mark GAAD.

In India too, there are a few events taking place.
PayPal Accessibility Team will be hosting a panel discussion on “Accessibility” at their office in Chennai. Please visit Event details and registration. Last date to register is 7th May 2013. Also, follow PayPal Accessibility Team on Twitter for updates.

Thanks to Sunil Abraham and his team at Centre for Internet and Society, who will be hosting a three hour public event. Event will consist of two presentations about accessibility in general and accessibility testing. That follows demonstrations of different assistive technologies and how people with disabilities use the web. More than that, it will be an awesome opportunity to network with other colleagues in the industry. Visit GAAD 2013 Bangalore page for event details and registration. Please spread the word!

At a personal level, I’ll be answering questions related to web accessibility and questions can be sent to helpdesk(at)sgaccessibility(dot)com. Please see my plans for GAAD on GAAD 2013 page on my initiative website

BarrierBreak and NASSCOM Foundation presents an awareness webinar to mark Global Accessibility Awareness Day. Please visit Webinar Information and registration

so what’s your plan? You can celebrate GAAD either in a small or a big way. Every effort towards creating awareness would count. You can do as small as asking your colleagues to use their computers without mouse for an hour!

More details about other events will be posted here as I know of. Stay tuned and in the meanwhile, let us know how you would be celebrating.

Happy GAAD!

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Recap of International Day of Persons with Disabilities 2012

December 3rd, 2012

Greetings on the auspicious occasion of International Day of Persons with Disabilities. Hope you have read my earlier post asking plans to celebrate International Day of Persons with Disabilities and today, I’ll be writing what I have done and some of the events I have noticed.

I am quite happy that lot has been celebrated today that reflect the them for this year Removing barriers to create an inclusive and accessible society for all. To recap:

Hoenstly, I couldn’t plan much at my work as we are planning an event for January to create awareness about disability and accessibility; however, I have sent out a communication explaining about the day and encouraged them to do following activities:

Activity 1:
Let’s use eBay and PayPal without using mouse for half-an-hour.

  1. Go to http://ebay.in or http://ebay.com
  2. Choose a category of your choice and select product
  3. Attempt to use payment options (You don’t really have to buy, you can stop activity at the payment option page)

Activity 2:
You can attempt to use any of your favorite sites like Cleartrip.com redbus.in Incomstaxindia.gov.in without mouse and share your experience.

Tip: Tab key will take you from one element to another element

Activity 3:
Are you a iPhone / iPad / iPod user? Go to Settings -> General -> Accessibility and turn on VoiceOver; Now go to your email / Messages – try and compose.
Tip: Single tap will announce the item you touch and double tap will activate!

Wow, received some amazing experiences especially using the iPhone and iPad with VoiceOver:-)

Post noon, I have participated in the panel discussion organized by Diversity and Inclusion team of HCL Technologies and NASSCOM Foundation – Thank you all for inviting me and it was truly a great initiative (Thanks Srimathi, Chitra, Tad and Raji for all the effort). During the discussion, we have learned about the initiatives run by Wadhwani Foundation, V-Shesh – a company that is striving towards inclusive employment (Nice to meet you Raja!), the amazing work being done by Kalasalingam University – perhaps the first university to offer integrated B-Tech program; Thank you Dr. Kaniappan for joining on the call despite of the busy schedule both at work and personal front; indeed it was a pleasure listening to you and then our good friend Rama Chari of DEOC spoke about the policies and focused on Article 27 – Work and Employment of UNCRPD (Thank you Rama) and then I had a great pleasure of speaking about best practices to offer inclusive environment on the job. Thank you guys for such a wonderful opportunity and thank you all the participants those attended. Please stay tuned for its recording.

Other events I have noticed:

I’m sure, there must be several events going on across the globe and sincere appreciation to everyone and I am glad to be part of the accessibility industry that impacts a lot to the society.

Good luck,

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International Day of Persons with Disabilities (IPDP) 2012, what are your plans?

November 20th, 2012

I wish, I should have seen the United Nations Page on International Day of Persons with disabilities 2012 a bit earlier… Theme for this year is something very close to my heart. The theme of IPDP 2012 is “Removing barriers to create an inclusive and accessible society for all”. This is something truly meaningful and an urgent need. So what are your plans? Shall we all pledge to create an inclusive and accessible society for all? Great, at least, let’s have that dream and start working to that direction.

I know, it will not happen over night, but if we don’t try, we will not see that happening on any day. So, firstly, let’s put together the barriers that we face on regular basis and prioritize them. Then, let’s identify and bring in all the stakeholders. Explain them about each problem and it would be great to offer possible recommendations. Remember to tell them, why such a solution is important. I firmly believe, most often, problems can be addressed by talking and working together with stake holders and need not take any legal help. We see barriers, due to lack of awareness and not that anyone would ever have intention to create barriers. So, have you started listing down the barriers you see? Great, in the interest of time, we may not be able to address any problems before 3rd December, 2012 but at least let’s have a list ready and at least get a pledge and plan in place for addressing the issues. OK, did you ask me, where do we do? Good question, let’s start with wherever we work or study!! What do you say?

Another idea would be on 3rd December, 2012, create awareness among your own co-workers, show them, how you use technology or perform day-to-day job; if the applications you use, either job related or for intranet have accessibility issues, bring them to the notice of the people concerned and work with them on a plan to address the issue. Take your co-workers across your office and show them, if there are any infrastructure barriers. Remember to appreciate, if you notice any good work.

Feel free to share here whatever you have planned or done. Good luck, let’s make the auspicious event a grand success!

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Importance of Braille – Tribute to Louis Braille

January 3rd, 2012

Louis Braille

Louis Braille

Hello All:

January 4th is Birthday of Dr. (I know, he do not have an official doctorate, but he deserves it) Louis Braille.

Louis Braille is inventor of Braille Script that is used by people with vision impairment to read and write. This script is based on six tiny dots. Louis got this idea originally from the military secret code language that consist of 12 digits.

Today, there is an advancement of technology and people with vision impairment can can use comoputers and several other devices like scanner, OCRetc to have access to print material. Having said that, Braille is still important. I could immediately think of two benefits of Braille for people with vision impairment. One is this helps to improve the spellings and second is Braille would be quite helpful for those who don’t like to listen so much or do not wish to use ear phones in busy places.

Watch an interesting video on Louis Braille.

Are you excited to learn Braille?Go to Learn the English Braille Online

Braille Alphabets

Braille Alphabets

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International Day of Persons with Disabilities – what it means to me?

December 2nd, 2011

Hello, firstly, warm wishes to everyone on marking the International Day of Persons with Disabilities – 3rd December, and I know, there are a lot of events planned across India and rest of the world. Congratulations everyone for being very active to create awareness towards disability.

I only have three messages; one is for society, second is for the organizations working for people with disabilities and finally for all friends with disabilities.

Dear Society, I could see a lot of change from the past to now! There is a rapid growth in sensitization towards disability and I am happy for it. Having said that, let’s not stop here. Let’s all continue the good work and sensitization happens at every corner of the world. There are still urban cities besides the rural world, where the awareness level towards disability is pretty low and get scared to offer opportunity to the persons with disabilities. Friends, thanks to the technology, today people with disabilities could perform any task with equal quality and within the given time. But only thing is that, we all need to ensure inclusive infrastructure and systems in place. Once again thank you all and look forward to continue the good work with all of you together.

Dear Organizations working for Persons with Disabilities: It’s time to ensure your clients get the perfect skills and aptitude. Today, there is a lot of awareness among the society and no employer would really worry about the disability that employee may have, but certainly would be of concern, if the employee do not show the productivity. Let’s think on the requirements of the industry and ensure our clients join the competition. Good luck and thanks for doing all the good work.

Dear friends with disabilities: Hello, come on, today, there is almost nothing that we cannot do. Let’s make good use of technologies available and run along with the mainstream. No one come and give us a hand to grow; it’s our duty to find the path and make our career. Let’s take the advantage of the technology and grab the opportunities. On the other note, if you employed somewhere and need support may it be in terms of infrastructure or accessibility, ask for it, do not hesitate. It’s right to ask for reasonable accommodation.

Good luck everyone!

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World Braille Day – three cheers to Louis Braille!

January 4th, 2011

January 4th is the Birth Anniversary of Louis Braille! Louis Braille is the inventor of written script for visually impaired. Watch this video!

See a Video to learn more about Louis Braille

Do you want to learn Braille? See this resource External Website

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Memories with my teachers

September 4th, 2010

September 5th is a day I celebrate most as it gives me an opportunity to acknowledge all my teachers who have been responsible for the life that I am leading today. Firstly, let me share some of my memories as to how we used celebrate teacher’s day during school days.

While I was studying at ZP High School, Injaram, we used to have a simple function to facilitate our teachers and other Gurus in our village. Some of the teachers who taught us right from 1st class through 8th class are Shri. Poolla Kameshwara Rao, Shri. T Vanamayya, Shri. Vellanki Kameshwara Rao, Shri. Joga Rao, Shri. Sri Rama Moorthy, Shri Acharyulu, Shri. Patnala Rama Rao, Shri. B. Subba Rao (late), Ammaji Miss, etc.

I have studied 9th and 10 classes at Govt. High School, Hyderabad where we have enjoyed a lot with celebrations. On 4th, we the students used to take charge of the entire school and run the school and I was fortunate enough to lead this activity for both the days. On 5th September, we used to facilitate our teachers with flowers and teachers used to bless us. My teachers at this school includes Shri. Ravi Kumar, Shri. Lakshmana Chary, Shri. Prabhakar, Shri. Srinath, Smt. Jayashree, Shri. Sudhakar Rao etc.

Some of the other teachers who are responsible for my growth are Ms. Pallavi, Ms. Dipti Masarani, Ms. Shilpi Kapoor, my tution teachers, Mr. Narasimha Murty etc.

All my teachers, Thanks a lot for all the enouragement, guidance and support you have given. I love you all and let me take this opportunity to seek blessings from each one of you.

Love you all and wishing you a very happy teacher’s day!

What is teacher’s day?
In India, teacher’s day is celebrated on 5th September every year to tribute Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, who happened to be a great teacher and advocate of education. Read on at

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My experience at Techshare India 2010

February 21st, 2010


Techshare India 2010 was another unique experience and an excellent platform to network, learn and share!

I have reached Delhi on 14thFebruary, 2010 (hmm. enjoyed business class flight in spite having economy class flight due to overbooking of the flight!) and visited India Habitat Centre in the evening; it was pleasure to meet whole gang of my BarrierBreak friends! Charminar area was full of working going on and getting ready for Techshare India 2010. Again, it was fun to be with Sachin Verma of EmployAbility who was putting Braille labels in the lifts!

15th February, with fellow Yahoos, I have reached venue at 7:30 AM and our event vendor has done a great job and Yahoo! stall was looking so colorful. Thank you guys!! Thanks Shilpi for the great help at the last minute…

Techshare India 2010 started with the Welcome address by Ms. Shilpi Kapoor, Managing Director, BarrierBreak Technologies, she explained her intention behind bringing Techshare to India in 2008 and developments took place during this two years. A few highlights we have seen in India after Techshare India 2008 are India has come up with Guidelines for Indian Government Websites, a few Indian Government Websites have become accessible including National Portal of India (English), National Portal of India (Hindi), RTI Website and recently, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. There’s also an effort in progress to bring National Policy on Electronic Accessibility which would be open for public review soon.

Kevin Cary, Chair, Royal National Institute of the Blind People (RNIB) has mentioned about the RNIB’s prospective behind organizing Techshare and expressed happiness to see their brand conference in India. Also, he expressed that soon Techshare will be organized in other countries like Africa, China etc. He mentioned, India is one of the first countries to ratify the United Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Javed Abidi, Director, NCPEDP shared his view what the accessibility is all about and it’s important. He says there are about 5000+ Indian Government websites that are inaccessible as per the survey they have conducted during 2008 and he hopes to see all of them accessible soon.

Shri. Mukul Wasnik, Hon'ble Minister, Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment addressing at the inaguration of Techshare India Exhibition

Techshare India’s Assistive Technologies Exhibition was inaugurated by Shri. Mukul Wasnik, Hon’ble Minister, Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, Government of India; while addressing, he expressed his happiness to see such a fantastic exhibition and offered his full support both at his level as the Minister of SJ & E and at a personal level.

Further for next two days, there were 3 tracks of presentations focused on the importance of accessibility from business prospective and how it help not only people with disabilities but to everyone. Also, there was a workshop track for the duration of 2 hours each which was a platform to learn a specific technology like DAISY etc. Some of the key speakers include P. Anandan, Managing Director, Microsoft Research Lab India, Swaran Lata, W3C India Office, Steve Benette, Sales Director, Dolphin Computer Access, Anandraj Thangappan, Wipro Limited, Shilpi Kapoor, Managing Director, BarrierBreak Technologies etc.

Subramanyan Murali presenting at Techshare India 2010

Subramanyan Murali, Technical Lead, Yahoo! presented a paper on Fixing the Developers Mindset that has received a overwhelming response. I also take this opportunity to congratulate him for winning the Yahoo! Ratna Award, an annual recognition program at Yahoo! in India.

Srinivasu presenting at Techshare India 2010

I have presented a per on Need for Web accessibility in Developing Countries – Yahoo! Initiatives. Please view below slide share presentation.

There’s also a great response received for Yahoo!’s booth at Techshare India 2010 Exhibition. We have showcased Yahoo! Home page, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Search, Yahoo! Cricket and Yahoo! Careers. Also, we were happy to use open source screen reader NVDA to demonstrate Yahoo! properties and it’s glad that we have created awareness about this open source project which most of the visitors were not aware.

Another highlight besides the video of Accessibility Lab at Yahoo! stall is we have demonstrated how one can use different automated web accessibility tools to do a preliminary test of their website.

Kudos BarrierBreak for organizing and congrats Yahoo! for receiving good response.

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Techshare India 2010 – An Accessibility Conference and Assistive Technology Exhibition in India for 2nd time!

January 22nd, 2010


Techshare India was organized for the first time in India during February, 2008 by BarrierBreak Technologies in partnership with Royal National Institute of the Blind People and received a fantastic response with around 400 delegates, huge number of visitors saw the assistive technology exhibition. That was beginning of more innovations in India from technology prospective and I believe that has created a path towards everyone talking about accessibility in India. With great response received for the conference, Techshare India was also taken to Mumbai and Bangalore as roadshows!

Now, for the 2nd time, Techshare India 2010 is being organized on 15th & 16th February, 2010 at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. This time, there’re more exiting presentations and exhibitors and an opportunity to see many assistive technologies. I am hoping this will be a path way to bring more assistive technologies at affordable prices in India.

I’m excited to share that Yahoo! India R & D is one of the sponsors and exhibiting the thoughts and experiences. What else? my colleague Subrahmanyan Murali is talking about “Fixing the mindset of Developers” on 15th at 5:00 PM to 5:40 PM and I ‘ll be speaking on “Need for Web Accessibility in Developing Countries: Yahoo! initiatives” on 16th at 3:00 PM to 3:40 PM. Hope to catch up some of you there!

Below is an announcement by the organizers:

Techshare India 2010 – India’s Largest Conference on Accessibility and Assistive Technology Exhibition is being organized by BarrierBreak Technologies on 15th and 16th Feb 2010. This year the theme of the conference is “Bridging the Barriers”. This 2-day conference and exhibitions is a pan-disability event, where technology professionals meet to share experiences, products and research in the field of digital assistive technology.

The three main objectives of Techshare India 2010 will be to increase consciousness about accessibility, to offer a platform for knowledge sharing, and to extend the use of assistive technology. It is hoped that these objectives will be met by the inclusion of a wide variety of presentations and exhibitions from organizations and leading figures representing the digital technology disability sector.

View Agenda: http://techshare.barrierbreak.com/agenda2010.php

To register visit: http://techshare.barrierbreak.com/confreg.php (Special discounts for education institutes, NGOs and persons with disabilities)

Techshare India 2010 will also host a range of exhibits featuring the best in cutting-edge developments in assistive technology across India and beyond. We want to bring together a bouquet of products from switches, track balls, adaptive keyboards, sip-n-puff, screen readers, DAISY players, AAC devices, software for learning disabled to independent living products. Some of our exhibitors: Microsoft, IBM, Adobe, Yahoo! India, Dolphin Computer Access, Optelec, AbleNet and PRI Liberator.

The exhibition is a great place for teachers and parents of persons with disabilities, senior citizens, occupational therapist, persons with disabilities, etc. So if you know people who aren’t attending the main conference but may be interested in the visiting the exhibition which is Free, please pass on this message so they can experience part of Techshare India 2010.

View Exhibitors and Products: http://techshare.barrierbreak.com/exhibitorsfor2010.php

For more details write to us techshare@barrierbreak.com or call Pooja Nahata at +919820725102

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