KOZHIKODE: Utilising their technological and scientific skills, the students of National Institute of Technology, Calicut (NITC), are paving a path of self-reliance for the less affluent who cannot explore the world on their own.
The students have developed the working model of a smart ‘Blind man’s stick’ to guide the visually impaired on the obstacles along their path.
The smart stick model developed using sonar technology will be manufactured and supplied to the visually impaired students of a blind school by the NITC students as part of their social initiative ‘Aavishkar’, an integral part of their annual technical fest ‘Tathva’ to be held this month. The students are also preparing audio books associating with the ‘DAISY book project’ of the Kerala State Youth Welfare Board and Kerala Federation of Blind Youth Forum to enrich the visually challenged community with the audio content of literature and other books.
“Inspired by a model of smart walking stick developed by the students of Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, we developed the ‘Blind man’s stick’ at a very low cost. While the model developed at Delhi IIT incurred a cost of Rs 3,000, we were able to make ours at just Rs 1,000. We have developed a model using steel and PVC pipes to explore the technology. After acquiring a licence for the model, we will be bringing modifications to its looks and will be manufacturing a minimum of 80 such smart sticks in the next semester to supply it to the visually challenged students of a special school.
The school is yet to be identified,” said Aavishkar team head Nihal Latheef, a third year student. The walking stick they developed works on sonar technology. It sends ultrasound waves and senses the presence of objects by reflecting the sound waves back. The stick vibrates whenever any obstacle such as walls, trees, etc. is found on the path.
It will work both in indoor and outdoor modes, giving warning about the close obstacles in the indoor mode and even about distant objects in outdoor mode.
“The year 2015 being the ‘International Year of Light’, this year’s Tathva is also focusing on the theme and we thought of lighting up the lives of those who are deprived of light through Aavishkar,” said Nihal.
“Exploring the skills and technologies we acquired from the college for the benefit of the society is what we aim through Aavishkar. We have also installed a solar water heater at ‘Daivadhan’ old age home in Koothuparamba, Kannur. While the heater was bought using the fund raised from students, we ourselves assembled it and did the plumbing works there. We are also setting up a biogas plant at the old age home,” said Naval Bin Yousuf, a team member of Aavishkar.
The students have already prepared 30 audio books for the DAISY project and will be delivering a total of around 60 such books.
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