In an initiative to empower Persons with Disabilities, 100 websites of various State Governments/UTs under Accessible India Campaign were launched by the Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment Thaawarchand Gehlot on the occasion of ‘National Conference on Improving Accessibility’ here on Friday.
A statement by Ministry of Social Justice said that accessible websites are those websites into which Persons with Disabilities can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with the Web, and that they can contribute to the Web. The Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (Divyangjan) initiated a ‘Website Accessibility Project’ for State Government/Union Territories under Accessible India Campaign through ERNET India, an autonomous scientific society under the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), to make total 917 websites accessible and providing funds for the same.
The aim of the conference was to sensitize and bring awareness among different stakeholders including the officials of state government on accessibility in the context of recently enacted Rights of Persons with Disabilities, 2016.
It quoted the Minister as saying at the conference that the aim of the campaign is to make a barrier free environment for persons with disabilities all over the country for safe, dignified life of Persons with Disabilities.
The Ministry has so far organised around 5800 camps for distribution of assistive device to Divyangjans. The statement said that accessible Website Design Principles include providing appropriate alternative text, Caption video, transcripts for audio, making all documents (e.g., PDFs) to be accessible and make sure content is structured, clearly written and easy to read.
