On the occasion of World Telecom Day, Tata Teleservices (TTSL) received the ‘2nd National Telecom Award 2008’ for connecting with the physically challenged people through Project Drishti.

 

In an event organised by the Telecom Equipment Manufacturers’ Association (TEMA), Navin Chadha, chief information officer, Tata Teleservices, received the award from the Union Minister for Communications and IT, Thiru A Raja.

 

Project Drishti is a joint initiative of Tata Teleservices and the National Association for the Blind (NAB). Project Drishti aims at bringing new hope and opportunities to the visually challenged by helping them become self confident, self reliant and economically independent people. A dedicated team at TTSL trains the ‘agents’ and mentors them for personality development, voice modulation, handling customers, etc.

 

The pilot project was set up in Mumbai with 10 visually-challenged individuals making outbound calls to Tata Teleservices’ customers and educating them on various schemes, offers and promotions. Today, there are 20 agents working at the call centre and plans are on the anvil to add 10 more.

 

The success of Project Drishti has set the road map for implementing similar projects at a national level.