Being visually impaired is often considered as the worst form of disability. Blind people, who face problems in every walk of life, suffer the most when it is about education. As the braille system is very expensive, many of them simply can't afford it which leads them to drop out from education. Third Eye, a youth led project, empathise this suffering and has come with a solution grown from a sense of humane responsibilities. It is an initiative that helps the blind students by providing writers (scribes) for their examination and taking some other activities to improve their lifestyle.
Masrur Ishraq, founder of Third Eye, expressed his dream to provide aid to all blind students regarding their education. "Third Eye is working to help those specially abled students and provide them a better life with affordable education." The initiative began its journey on January 16, 2019. Starting from Chittagong University (CU), it now operates in five districts. Almost 400 volunteers from different areas of the country are working under the name. Khalikuzzaman June, the head of volunteers affairs of Third Eye, hopes it will expand soon and sees Third Eye as an international organisation in future. He believes that the organisation, for all its goodwill and works, will transcend the national boundary one day.
Third Eye operates different types of campaigns to reach to the blind students. As of now, 500 blind students are taking service from this organisation. "Though Third Eye is a relatively younger and non-profit organisation, it already covers five districts, which proves that enough exposure could lead the organisation go even bigger," said Tamanna Jahan, coordinator of Third Eye from Jashore district.
Third Eye does some other activities too. The volunteers collect books and notes from the related departments and record those readings verbally. Those recordings become a great help to the blind students. Third Eye also has a YouTube channel as well where content of cultural activities including song, recitation, drama, etc. by the blind students are uploaded. As for future plans, the organisation has announced two new clubs named Speaking Club and Reading Club, where blind students can enhance their personal skills along with English fluency.
Faisal Ahmed Ibrahim, a blind student of Chattogram University shared his gratitude towards Third Eye. He believes the altruistic work that the initiative is doing will help in making a society of humanity and cooperation. "I will always be grateful to the Third Eye volunteers," said Faisal with a soaked voice. "It's impossible to express my feelings towards Third Eye. They gave me a new life, new hope and new aspiration," exclaimed Md Shihab Uddin, another blind student of CU. Both of them hope that Third Eye will work on a much bigger scale and bring enormous success at making visually impaired students' life easier.
The writer studies at the banking and insurance department of CU. Reach him at
tanjimhasan001@gmail.com