Parimala Bhat reads Sparshdnyan, one of the world’s few newspapers to cater to the visually impaired.
This week’s Sunday Guardian carries a story on Sparshdnyan, a newspaper in Braille for the visually impaired. Published out of Bombay twice a month, the 48-page paper is sent out to some 400 subscribers in Maharashtra.
The paper’s editor Swagat Thorat estimates readership at 24,000 copies per issue, most of them in the 18-35 segment that advertisers love, but not surprisingly the paper gets no ads.
The editor tells correspondent Rick Westhead that he receives 600-700 letters each issue, and covers his Rs 30,000 per month administrative costs by selling wildlife pictures.
“We cover almost everything,” Thorat says, “but there are a few topics we don’t like.”
One, surprisingly, is India’s national passion: cricket.
“The paper we use is very expensive because it’s so thick for the Braille and I just don’t want to waste it on a topic that is covered in so many other places,” he says.
“I want to make sure we have more on things like science technologies, missions to Mars, and maybe more on India’s foreign policy.”
Photograph: courtesy The Sunday Guardian
Read the full article: Braille newspaper shows blind new world
Contact Sparshdnyan: sprshdnyan [at] gmail [dot] com
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IJR 
We are really hopeless when it comes to accessibility for the differentially abled. Very nice article.
I like the newspaper’s decision.
Great decision.