27-yr-old IITian-turned-bureaucrat devises govt's disability app

Manish Kumar 

New Delhi, Sept 26: After equipping himself with the required technical expertise of computer software and hardware functions, an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkeee turned bureaucrat has now devised a one-stop mobile app for the disabled.

The 27-year-old Anunaya Jha, who is currently working as the assistant secretary at the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities during his short stint at the ministry along with his colleague Susheela Banot (doctor-turned bureaucrat) in a span of three-month has developed the mobile application, envisioned to take care of the special needs of the differently-abled population of the country.

The mobile application christened as ‘Divyang Sarthi’ was launched Tuesday by the Union Social Justice and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities Minister Thawarchand Gehlot. The app has been planned to act a one-stop centre for the disabled to access all information related to their disability and rehabilitation.

“It can act a one-stop app for the disabled which can give them all required 

information like-government schemes, scholarships, list of institutions working for them, where to find assistive devices among others. Even blind persons can also use it as it is equipped with text reader and also text magnifier for people with low vision,” Jha said.

Banot meanwhile said that it will now likely end the trauma of the disabled people who had no option but to surf several other website for the information they wanted to seek. “We are hopeful that it will act as a guiding path for them,” Banot said.

When asked how the whole system was made, Jha said that the technical works relating to the formulation of the app was taken care by himself while research and some content work were done by Banot. “I worked on the technical aspect of forming the app. I also took the help of some students of IIT-Roorkee who happily jumped onto the bandwagon of the government project spearheaded by us,” said Jha.

The duo budding bureaucrats are now working to improve the app by adding more features in the coming days like inclusion of more languages besides English/Hindi and including sign languages so that more types of differently-abled people can use the government’s disability app.

Jha hails from Motihari in Bihar and is a 2015-batch young IAS officer working with the government. He finished his studies at IIT Roorkee in 2012 before jumping onto the bandwagon of Indian bureacracy.