Government Launches PM e-Vidya DTH Channel 31 For Hearing-Impaired Students

The Government of India started PM e-Vidya DTH Channel 31, devoted to Indian Sign Language (ISL) training, on December 6, 2024. The initiative focuses on meeting the educational needs of deaf students, special educators, interpreters, and organizations working in the field.

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and Minister of State for Skill Development Jayant Chaudhary inaugurated the channel. This is to make education more accessible to children, which is in line with National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. It focuses on promoting and standardizing ISL to achieve inclusivity in education.

As per Census 2011, 19% of India’s 2.68 crore persons with disabilities are suffering from hearing impairments. Similarly, WHO projects that nearly 63 million Indians have significant auditory impairment. To bridge this gap, Channel 31 shall provide television-based ISL training modules so that access for the hearing impaired is facilitated in learning.

ISL is a structured language that enables communication for hearing-impaired individuals. In 2020, the Indian Sign Language Research and Training Centre (ISLRTC) partnered with the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) to translate school textbooks into ISL. This project, expected to be completed by 2026, is part of a broader effort to integrate ISL into the education system.

PM e-Vidya: Bridging the Learning Gap PM e-Vidya was initiated in May 2020 under the Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan with the vision of making education equitable and quality for all through digital, online, and on-air mediums. It supports NEP 2020’s vision of inclusive education and has helped in reducing learning gaps mainly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The main features of PM e-Vidya are:

DIKSHA: A digital platform with high-quality e-content, such as QR-coded Energized Textbooks.

SWAYAM: MOOC platform for school and higher education courses.

DTH Channels: Started with 12 and increased to 200 channels, broadcasting in several Indian languages.

Virtual Labs and e-Labs: Interactive tools for learning science, mathematics, and skills.

The initiative has gained international recognition, as UNESCO awarded the PM e-Vidya program the ICT in Education Prize in 2022 for innovative use of technology.

The government emphasized that it is through this launch of Channel 31 that a crucial step of making education accessible to hearing-impaired students would be taken. Mainstream education through the infusion of ISL into regular education aims at creating balanced learning grounds where there is fair accessibility of students to quality education regardless of their abilities.

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