37-year-old Sumit Rakshit is a resident of Delhi. As a working professional, Sumit successfully climbed up the corporate ladder in his 13 years of work with reputed companies. He was responsible for deploying teams to various projects, training, liaising, overseeing offshore transitions and several other tasks attached to his managerial role.
Sumit quite enjoyed his work as well as the respect that came with the position. Four years ago, Sumit suddenly started losing vision. This threw him off-guard and thereon started a saga of medical shopping. During the course of his multiple surgeries, Sumit lost his job. Ultimately the doctors told him that his eye condition was uncorrectable and degenerative.
But Sumit refused to accept his impairment and he continued to see doctors with faint hope. One of the doctors fortunately redirected him to Eyeway, which was going to be the beginning of his transformation.
Initially Sumit was very reluctant to accept himself as a person with disability. He refused to get a proper assessment done so he could be issued a Disability Certificate, based on which he could avail employment opportunities and other programmes. But persistent counseling by the Eyeway team slowly helped him take the right steps forward.
Over the past one year of engaging with Eyeway, Sumit has realized that he can continue to work as there are millions of people like him, who continue living normal lives despite their vision impairment. He is now actively hunting for jobs. Eyeway has also put him in touch with organizations, recruitment agencies and other NGOs which facilitate employment for visually impaired people.
But Sumit needs to further prepare himself for total sight loss. At present he wears correctional glasses which helps him read and move around with little help. He hasn’t yet fully accepted the need to reorient himself and acquire skills to function as a totally blind person. Eyeway has recommended him to undergo mobility and computer training so the scope of his independence and employment opportunities will widen.
He believes once he gets back to a work environment, he will learn to adapt and retrain himself. When he called Eyeway, Sumit was confused and angry with the sudden turn of events, but today he is more calm and willing to give everything a chance.