I have the hard copy. Every page of the book has photographs. Some have a
little write up of the person being featured on that page.
Its a beautiful visual coffee table book.
Though the book impacts with its photographs I am sure all the people
featured have interesting lives and stories.
Maybe Sipra can speak with you about the reason for the book and how she
worked towards its conception and release.
Kanchan Pamnani
Advocate & Solicitor
9, Suleman Chambers,
Battery Street, Colaba,
Mumbai - 400 039.
----- Original Message -----
From: "avinash shahi" <shahi88avin...@gmail.com>
To: "AccessIndia: a list for discussing accessibility and issues
concerningthe disabled." <accessindia@accessindia.org.in>
Sent: Friday, March 14, 2014 4:46 PM
Subject: Re: [AI] Ground Zero: They don't know what darkness is
byRajChengappa
You are right, and this piece by Mr raj was appeared on 24th November
2013.
Do share the book if you have in digital copy, please?
On 3/14/14, Kanchan Pamnani <kanchanpamn...@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
The book was released on 18th November 2013 at Rashtrapati Bhavan by the
president of India. The Chief Justice of India Mr. L. K. Advani, Ms.
Brinda
Karat and other luminaries were present.
Its been a great work by Sipra Das. She spent many hours with each of
the
persons whom she has captured on her camera. I know it has taken several
years in the making because she interviewed me sometime in the second
quarter of 2009.
Prior to this book she has held an exhibition of photographs of the
visuallly impaired.
I have been showing this book to many who are not visually impaired and
they
are amazed by what they see.
Sipra is a photo journalist from Delhi.
Kanchan Pamnani
Advocate & Solicitor
9, Suleman Chambers,
Battery Street, Colaba,
Mumbai - 400 039.
----- Original Message -----
From: "avinash shahi" <shahi88avin...@gmail.com>
To: "AccessIndia: a list for discussing accessibility and issues
concerningthe disabled." <accessindia@accessindia.org.in>
Sent: Friday, March 14, 2014 12:54 PM
Subject: Re: [AI] Ground Zero: They don't know what darkness is by
RajChengappa
Ya it was released in May 2013, but how many of us knew about it?
On 3/14/14, George Abraham <geo...@eyeway.org> wrote:
The book was released some time back!
-----Original Message-----
From: AccessIndia [mailto:accessindia-boun...@accessindia.org.in] On
Behalf
Of avinash shahi
Sent: 14 March 2014 11:47
To: jnuvision; worldopinion; accessindia; sayeverything
Subject: [AI] Ground Zero: They don't know what darkness is by Raj
Chengappa
How beautifully written piece talks about ourselves.
Now I understood why Mr Raj has been so upbeat about reporting and
writing about blind people in particular and disabled in general.
We should certainly invite author of the book Sipra Daas to discuss
her photographic journey in the lives of blind people some day in
Delhi.
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2013/20131124/ground.htm
They don't know what darkness is
It is society that continues to remain both blind and dark about the
world of the visually impaired and their extraordinary capabilities.
Raj Chengappa
There are so many sordid happenings in the country these days that the
little good that occurs is often buried in a welter of negative news.
Among them was the President of India releasing a book titled "The
Light Within", a photo chronicle of the many visually impaired people
in our country, which I had the pleasure of introducing. The pictures
taken by Sipra Das, a journalist and former colleague, show a deep
understanding of the lives of the people who cannot see and yet
demonstrate an extraordinary ability to experience the fullness of
life shorn of self-pity, diffidence or bitterness.
Billamangal Sardar visits home in Kolkata once a year, only to be
greeted by neglect.
Among the many telling photographs in the book that I liked is that of
J. Kaul, a New Delhi teacher. While he listens to a transistor, his
wife Usha, who has also lost her sight, lovingly sews a button onto
his shirt. Kaul says that when he met Usha "it was love at first
sight", and adds, "Who says I am blind? I cannot see with my eyes but
I can see with my heart. That is something you cannot."
Then there are moving visuals of Vishal Rao, a sightless 29-year-old,
playing his flute in a boat in the backwaters of Mumbai. Vishal says
his impairment actually gives him greater powers of concentration,
which helps him pick up skills faster than most other people. Rao
says, "I enjoy beauty of all sorts, it does not matter how it is
conveyed, whether through sound, touch or smell."
Many of them like Nakul Adhikari even joke about their handicap. A
physiotherapist in Mumbai, he says with a smile, "A normal girl will
get pure love from a blind boy like me for I will never look at
another woman."
Yet, as the pictures in the book and the brief write-ups next to them
show, we as a society continue to discriminate against the visually
impaired. There is a photograph filled with poetry and pathos of
Billamangal Sardar, a 14-year-old from Kolkata, at the seashore
enjoying the feel, the smell and the sound of the sea surf. He says,
"Some people feel that I am helpless and a burden. My family and
friends have no idea what I am capable of. They think I am abnormal. I
do not react because I don't think it's worth it." There are many such
moving pictures in Sipra's book that will help you fathom the world of
the blind and no more look upon them with pity or discomfort.
I have a personal anecdote that helped me understand their world
better. I met a visually impaired couple in Agra while visiting Taj
Mahal in the mid-Eighties. The irony of the situation struck me as
they went around touching what is the world's most beautiful monument
of love.
On the return journey to Delhi, we were seated in the same railway
compartment and I struck up a conversation with them. When we alighted
I offered them a lift home and was surprised when after a few minutes
the man scolded the taxi driver for taking a wrong turn. I asked him
how he knew that, and he said he had memorised the number of turns to
his house and the time taken before each so that no taxi driver could
cheat him.
I was impressed and after that spent days with them understanding
their life. They lived in a government accommodation in Delhi with two
children, both with normal vision. He worked as a teacher in a music
school and knew the road to it by feel and sound. He knew he was
walking in an open area by listening to the way the birds flapped
their wings - if they flew freely it meant there was no building
obstructing flight. He told me that at night when he slept he dreamt
only "in words". For me, the most memorable statement was when I asked
him whether he knew what light was. He said: "I don't know what
darkness is."
The visually impaired do not live a life of darkness - they shine, as
the title of Sipra's book says, with the light within. It is society
that continues to remain both blind and dark about their world and
their extraordinary capabilities. We need to dispel the darkness that
shrouds our attitude towards them and work towards changing the
misperceptions that we have about the abilities of the visually
impaired.
r...@tribuneindia.com
--
Avinash Shahi
M.Phil Research Scholar
Centre for The Study of Law and Governance
Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi India
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