Braille Greeting Cards

The blind never get greeting cards. You could, this festival season, send greeting cards to a Blind School. If you know someone who is visually disabled, this is your chance to make their day! Braille greeting cards can be either all Braille, or a normal greeting card that has Braille on it. Both options are available with Esha.

Tactile Maps

What is it:
A Tactile map is a map that can be read by touch. A tactile map of the layout of your building /office /facility will ensure that a blind person is able to find his way around the facility without being constantly escorted. Tactile maps are used by both visually disabled and hearing disabled. Esha tactile maps are special in a way that the same map can be used by all three kinds of disability.

These tactile maps can be delivered in any of the following ways:

1. DIY Kits – Esha will provide kits that can be used by employees in the organization to create their own tactile maps. These maps are easy to do and increate employee ownership of the inclusive environments.

2. Made to order Tactile maps – Ready to use tactile maps are created by a disabled person (NOT a visually disabled person) and delivered. As usual, the money goes entirely to the disabled person.

3. Workshop – Train the trainer – In this method, we train one or more key people from the organization, and they in turn, involve other employees /residents / students. The group then creates tactile maps together.

Braille Cards

What is it:
Braille-enabled visiting cards are your standard visiting cards with a special feature, your name embossed in Braille. The brailling is done for a rupee per card and can be done on your existing cards! This means you don’t have to reprint your cards at all. Just commission Esha to do the brailling and you will have a new set of cards at your desk in a week’s time, wherever you are located in the country.

How is it done:
Brailling is done on a brailler, which is a special machine for the blind. It resembles a typewriter and works like one too.
What’s in it for me:
More than you can imagine. For a rupee per card, you get your cards looking exquisite. Also they are transformed almost into something that says more than what’s written. Giving out a Braille-enabled card, says:
a. You are sensitive and inclusive, without being flashy about it.
b. You(and your business) are serious about a commitment to fair employment practices and inclusive communication.

In addition to this, if a blind person happens to receive your card, imagine his delight at being able to make sense of it, as opposed to a card with printed words only. Imagine your delight at not being red faced when you suddenly meet someone in your work and the person happens to be visually challenged.

How do the blind benefit:
Esha outsources the brailling of cards to blind professionals. The money made on each card goes directly to the blind. If you get 100 cards done, they make Rs 100. Orders in large numbers and then repeat orders will ensure the blind make up to Rs 30,000 a month. Today, most blind make only about one-tenth that amount even when fully employed. More importantly, brailling cards is a dignified way to earn a sustainable livelihood while you get something equally substantial in return.

Corporate Social Responsibility made easy:
In the West, finding a disabled-friendly train station or a Braille menu in a restaurant is not uncommon. In India, while this reality is distant, inclusive communication is probably the easiest way to implement corporate social responsibility. Making office spaces and stationery disabled-friendly does not cost much. In fact, Esha is probably the only organisation that gets cards brailled-enabled for as less as a rupee. Our research shows in United States, a set of 100 Braille-enabled cards cost up to 77$! In India, we offer this service at under USD 3!! For more details or to place orders, Contact Us!

Theater Workshops

We conduct sensitisation workshops in schools, colonies and offices, wherever solicited. These workshops are based on the Theater Technique, and are therefore, inclusive, activity based, and fun.These workshops provide a refreshing change from the standard Team Building and other workshops usually used for children, employees and friends in a group.
The name of the workshop is STAGED ENCOUNTERS for adults and 9TANKI for the children's version.

The main aim of these workshops is two fold:
1. To make the participants more aware of their own gifts (incl. the gift of sight)
2. To make everyone a little more sensitive to the special needs of the differently-abled.

The workshops are (co-) conducted by a blind professional and are therefore a part of our employment options for the blind initiative.

Inclusive Environments

An inclusive environment is one in which the blind and/or other disabled find their way with ease. At Esha, we have a simple, effective 4-step process to make commercial, corporate and educational spaces friendly and non-intimidating for the blind. This exercise is also facilitated by blind professionals, who are auditors:

Step 1: Accessibility Audit:
To be done by a trained blind auditor.

Step 2: Short duration, non-intensive sensitisation workshops:
For every one who is likely to come in contact with the blind: colleagues, other staff, faculty, students and administrative staff.

Step 3: Making spaces blind-friendly:
Putting Braille placards, making small raised maps of the key buildings to help first-time visitors, and voice-recorded guides wherever necessary.

Step 4: First-time induction of any blind student/employee:
A specific training session to sensitise 2 members of staff in case of an office, and 2 members of faculty, staff and student community each, in case of an institution. It is expected that the knowledge will be readily transferred so that more and more people are capable of doing this induction whenever a blind person joins in.

Esha is equipped to help you plan and implement the initiative of making spaces of any kind and size inclusive for the blind – be it a commercial space, corporate or even a retail space. We can also help you make educational institutions and public spaces inclusive for the blind.