Satish Mishra, 21 years old is from Varanasi, UP and he lost his eyesight from brain fever when he was 16 years. His father is a farmer and mother is a homemaker.

He suffered from the brain fever while he was writing his 10^th exams, as a result of which he had to quit his exams half-way. The shock and disbelief of blindness were incomprehensible to him. He stayed indoors doing nothing for the next 2 to 3 years. On the advice of the neighbours his parents took him to Shankar Netralaya in Chennai for treatment. Without much progress achieved on his eye condition but with valuable information for his future they came back to Varanasi. The doctor whom they consulted gave the family much confidence and asked them to put Satish back in school. He suggested Jayati Bharatam in Varanasi as a potential institution.
Satish stayed in Jayati Bharatam for the next two years where he gained basic skills and completed his 9^th and 10^th standard. He is currently pursuing his 12^th standard from a blind school in Varanasi nearby his home. He got the Eyeway Helpdesk number from his classmates in Jayati Bharatam. After getting the number, Satish has contacted Eyeway with many issues related to ATM, information on competitive exams etc. In each of the cases, he was duly helped by the counsellor by sharing the RBI guidelines or by connecting him to the correct source.

Recently he faced an issue relating to scribe for giving his 12^th standard exams. He was denied a scribe of his choice by the District Inspector of Schools (DIOS). DIOS is the authority that allows scribes in the district among other education-related monitoring/inspections conducted. Surprisingly the DIOS put forth an unheard rule where the visually impaired examinee will have to pay 1 lakh rupees to get a scribe who is at par with the examinee in qualification or will have to bear with a scribe lesser qualified. The apparent rule was put across by the DIOS in an intimidating tone “either fail in the exam or pay 1 lakh rupees”, as shared by Satish. The MSJE guidelines were also dismissed as invalid by the DIOS.

Being apprised of this issue, Eyeway counsellor first clarified this “1 lakh Rupee” demand with the head of Jayati Bharatam in Lucknow. On confirmation that this could be misinformation or exploitation, the case was shifted to the State Commissioner for Persons with Disability (SCPD) with the backing of the school authorities. With Eyeway bringing SCPD’s intervention and school authorities’ support in the case, DIOS was forced to change his stance and allowed an 11^th qualified scribe for Satish.