Create jobs for persons with disabilities

Speakers at a roundtable yesterday put emphasis on the training, internship and employment of persons with disabilities so that they can live with dignity in the society.
The roundtable titled as 'Employment and Social Distinction for PWDs' was organised by Bangladesh Organisation for Disabled Advancement (BODA) at the National Press Club in the city.
The programme was held as part of 'Mainstreaming Persons with Disabilities through the Applied ICT Training' project.
The speakers called on the bankers, professionals and businessmen in the society to create ample employment opportunities for the persons with disabilities.
The project, funded by AB Bank Foundation, provided a six-month ICT training to 10 visually impaired and 10 physically challenged people so that they can work with the mainstream workforce.
The training includes office application, basic hardware, networking, internet, email, multimedia among other computer programming. The trainees have completed their internships and are now waiting to get employed in the mainstream organisations.
Md Abdus Salam, a visually impaired person with a graduate degree in economics from Islamic University, said he felt a lot more confident about doing a job after completing the course.
“When I first came to Dhaka from Kushtia, I found that it was very difficult to get a job without knowing ICT. Then I took this course and learnt MS Word, MS Excel, PowerPoint, Photoshop and many other things,” he said.
Salam is eager to work in the banking, NGO or government sector.
Lutful Alam Maruf, trainer of the programme, said the indomitable courage, determination and enthusiasm of differently able people have surprised him.
“They have the capability to overcome their limitations in their own ways which is very promising,” he added.
BODAM Executive Director Khalilur Rahman said, “We have arranged this event so that they can get employment with dignity in the society.”
In 2007, BODA took an initiative for applied ICT training for persons with disabilities to empower them.
Labour and Employment Minister Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain was present as the chief guest at the programme which was also attended by AB Bank Deputy Managing Director Niaz Habib as the special guest.