The students of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams’ (TTD) Sri Venkateswara Training Centre for the Handicapped (SVTCH) have proved that being physically challenged is hardly an impediment to becoming successful in life.
The training centre has recently conducted a placement drive for the first time in its 39 years of existence and 22 students have secured jobs in top multinational companies such as Colgate Palmolive, Mother Dairy, Foxconn and Hero Motors.
The institute was established on the Ugadi day in 1983 by the then Chief Minister N.T. Rama Rao with eleven vocational courses. However, some courses such as candle making, basket weaving and cane furniture making were dropped over the years due to lack of patronage.
At present, the institute offers training in the trade of fitters, turners, welders and tailors. The institute has focused on training graduates all these years and the students had to hunt for jobs.
Not many industrialists evinced interest in recruiting them, with the feeling that their disability might lead to errors at workplace. Then Deputy Chief Inspector of Factories M. Sivakumar Reddy chipped in to take the collective voice of the ‘voiceless’ to the notice of the industry.
“When I highlighted the issue on the sidelines of a meeting on industrial safety, many employers agreed to hire the students, but after a test,” Mr. Reddy told The Hindu.
“Our students are eligible to apply for similar jobs in the government sector under the 3% quota for the disabled,” said TTD Education Officer C. Govindarajan, who played an instrumental role in conducting the placement drive.
The institute actually caters to orthopaedically handicapped, hearing impaired, partially/fully blind, locomotory disabled and mildly retarded categories, but the response has been huge from the hearing impaired. As the TTD runs high schools for this category in Tirupati, Bhimavaram and Warangal, a sizeable chunk of them after passing the SSC examinations opt for our institute for higher education, said Principal N. Ramana Murthy.
The college is in talks with the Railway Carriage Repair Shop (CRS) at Renigunta for an in-plant training programme for its students.
