KOZHIKODE: Even during lockdown, Luddites may refuse to adopt digital platforms but members of the Kerala Federation of the Blind Youth Forum has proved that their vision and mettle are a cut above the rest. The youth wing made history by holding arguably the state's first group conference using the 'Zoom' app on Sunday with more than 60 participants.
“It was a valedictory ceremony to mark the culmination of our training programme, which began on April 19,” said Anil Kumar B, the president of the youth wing, who works at Punjab National Bank in Kayamkulam. The video conference was also attended by well-wishers.
Like a formal programme, it had invocation, public address, a slew of cultural performances as well as a brief period for all to speak. The two-hour-long function ran smoothly with admirable ease and was fully moderated and curated by the members of the forum. While degree student Dona Susan emceed the event,
Ajeesh Thomas, an IBM employee, ensured that technical snags were avoided.
Cine artist Allepey Ashraf gave the inaugural speech and short-film director Joy Mathew addressed the gathering.
The training workshop for the vision-impaired was led by Jincy Soy of Enable India, Bengaluru and Anju Narayanan of Cochin Rotary Cochin Global foundation, Infopark. “Along with Zoom app, they trained us to use many such android based applications,” said Anil.
“Ajeesh even knew how to unmute the speaker at the exact moment the emcee calls out a name from the participants. I’m sure people like me cannot pull this off without a glitch” said an overwhelmed guest.
Many members of the group performed live. Sreelakshmi crooned a film song in karaoke while Jose C John sang a Carnatic rendition. Another member, Akhil sang a Tamil film song. “We cannot show a blind eye to the progress in technological growth around us," said Anil. Gayathri Madhusudan from the volunteer group Dyuthi, which provides services to the blind, said, “The invocation song sang by Anu
Johny and Aby Johny ‘Logam muzhuvan sukham pakaranayi Snehadeepame mizhi thuraku’, was indeed poetic and moving.”