NEW DELHI — As per the latest estimates of the Indian statisticians, around 6 million Indians are hard of hearing and also without a voice. For far too long, the concerns and needs of the deaf culture have been ignored despite the constant documentation as well as petitions by various civil society groups and non- governmental organizations.

However, with the advent of the new millennium, some Indians who are hard of hearing as well as cannot speak advocated for the establishment of an institution that would focus on teaching, research and development of the Indian Sign Language (ISL).

Indian Sign Language has now become the standard language used across India, by the people who are deaf and mute. However, unfortunately, ISL has not really been in vogue at the special schools for these affected people yet. Teacher training programs have not been able to sufficiently conduct awareness drives/orientations that are geared towards ISL teaching methods.

In many cases, teaching material is unable to incorporate sign languages either. The penetration of these awareness drives is so low that most parents of such children are left unaware that there is a language that could help their child communicate with ease, and could entirely remove all communication barriers with immediate effect and at a relatively low investment.

With the aforementioned issues at hand, the most significant shot in the arm that the deaf culture received in India was the inclusion of the Indian Sign Language in the Five-Year Plan. The 11th Five-Year Plan of 2007-2012 acknowledged the needs of the millions of people in India that had hearing disabilities and until now they were a relatively neglected part of the society.

The Plan envisaged the development of the sign language and a training center, which would inculcate a sense of research within the field, aimed at promoting the Indian sign language as well. In addition, it was also planned that a rigorous training mechanism for the teachers/interpreters would be adopted in the coming decade.

Resultantly, the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment established the Indian Sign Language Research & Training Centre (ISLRTC) in 2011 which was later integrated as a society in the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities. Within the center, apart from grooming many sign language interpreters as well as research on the same, the center has focused substantially on providing equal access to the 6 million people through the development of novel technology.

For these 6 million Indians, the development happening daily at the center is essentially providing a new lease of life to them in terms of their education, work and personal activities.

Apart from the same, the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act 2016 was initiated whereby facilities have been provided to the deaf and person with speech impairment. In case the family monthly income is less than Rs.15,000/- and the child is below 5 years of age, the government shall bear all expenses towards the cochlear implant.

In fact, the scheme provides for speech therapy sessions to be provided to those children in need for a period of two years. Special arrangements have been made to ensure sufficient training and skill development can also take place, for these individuals as well.

Interestingly, sign language has been in use for the last many decades but there was no clarity or uniformity when it came to which version or kind of language was being used throughout the nation. In fact, the same thing or word was being stated through different ways. An interesting example would be the sign with both arms placed on top of the fist, which denotes marriage in South India while it denotes jail in North India.

Therefore, similar words and phrases caused massive confusion in the minds of the people in the country, which resulted in the need to develop a uniform sign language. Resultantly, the Indian Sign Language Research and Training Centre created the first Indian sign language dictionary, which would act as a bridge between language and the prominent regional variations that existed at that point. At this point, more than 10,000 words over 3 volumes have been included in the dictionary as already.

If this was not fascinating enough, this is the first instance of a sign language being recognized as a language and given the status of a subject in India. As a result, the first step towards realizing that the sign language being developed is in itself a subject has been achieved.

All NCERT textbooks, teacher manuals, supplementary textbooks and resources from Classes I to XII of both Hindi as well as English medium are now in the process of being converted into Indian sign language as well. The initiative would result in massive benefits to the hearing-impaired students and teachers as well.

Therefore, in its inclusive approach towards different sections of the society, the government has taken a significant number of steps to extend the benefits to a number of groups that were previously ignored, like Scheduled Tribes, Persons with Disabilities, Women, etc. Prominent and most recent inclusion to the list of groups that are now being prioritized under the government at this point is of the deaf and people with speech impairment. — Agencies