Members of the Vellore and Tiruvannamalai districts Blind Teachers Association and Tamil Nadu Self-Confident Blind Services Society (TNSCBSS) staged a demonstration in front of the collectorate here on Monday. They expressed solidarity with the members of the Blind Students and Graduate Association, who were fasting in Chennai since September 16, over a host of demands.

President of the association A Markantan, who led the agitation, said all blind persons in the State have been agitating seeking an audience with the Chief Minister to express the grievances. The main demand was the implementation of the 3 per cent job reservation for visually challenged persons, he added.

Secretary of the association Sankar said the government should consider waiving the TET, SET and NET examinations for qualified blind candidates for the appointment of teachers in the schools and colleges.

 Among the other demands are: blind music teachers to be employed by the HR&CE department as ‘Odhuvar’,  unemployment dole provided by the State to be hiked from the present `450 to `2,000; pension benefits for the blind and old pension to be restored; blind teachers to be provided assistance to pay ‘readers’ and for other teaching tools; JAWS software on free laptops distributed to blind students; and one per cent reservation for blind students in all educational institutions.

Anbalagan, secretary of the TNSCBSS said the 3 per cent reservation for blind persons in government jobs was announced in 2005, but was not implemented in the past eight years.

“We are not asking for the government to do announce new schemes, merely implement the existing ones, he added.

The agitators later submitted a petition to collector P Sankar with a request to forward the same to the Chief Minister.

Source: The New Indian Express