Surinder Mavi
Winnipeg, December 26
A device designed by Jyoti Gokeraju, a Grade 12 student at Saskatoon’s Walter Murray Collegiate, to help blind and deaf people communicate is receiving national acclaim. About this, Jyoti Gokeraju said, “I actually started working on this project in 2023. Jyoti Gokeraju credits his success to his teachers, who let him work on parts of the invention as class projects.”
All translations are automated in this app by Gokeraju. “Usually you would need someone who knows how to translate English into Braille, but in this device I have something recorded in English or French translated automatically,” he said. Along with this research, he developed a Braille device called Touch Talk using pre-existing 3D printed parts. Users can use this device to exchange ideas between a computer app and Touch Talk.” Jyoti’s device won the Gold Excellence Award at the 2024 Canada-Wide Science Fair. He said he was happy to receive the recognition, but the project was more important to him.
Jyoti Gokeraju said he was inspired to create the device after meeting his grandfather in India. Jyoti Gokeraju said, “My grandfather is a very interesting person. They used to talk to us a lot but when I went there now I was shocked to see that they didn’t talk as much as before and their hearing was getting worse.” What if his grandfather also lost his eyesight after hearing. This would mean that they would not be able to communicate with him.
Jyoti contacted researchers at the Canadian National Institute for the Blind to learn more about the issue and found that people with blindness and deafness often rely on volunteer guide communicators. Guided communicators are often shallow and do not provide the level of freedom that some people desire in their communication. He built this device for less than $100, while other devices cost around $3,000.