The Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology Sachin Pilot on Thursday released a software Text-To- Speech, TTS system for differently abled persons in New Delhi. Speaking on the occasion Mr. Pilot said that this initiative is a significant step towards digital inclusion of differently abled people from different linguistic background.

He said, these technologies will go a long way in assisting them to become part of the Information Technology mainstream. The Minister expressed hope that use of these technologies will provide an impetus towards wider usage of Indian languages for governance and related applications. He said that it will also augment social inclusiveness and reach out to specially-abled section of the society.

AIR correspondent adds that Text-to-Speech is computer software which renders the machine readable text into Human Voice. It will enable people with visual impairments or low vision disabilities to listen to written works on a computer or a mobile device. Initially TTS is released in six Indian languages including Hindi, Marathi, Bangla, Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam. The remaining Indian languages will also be covered soon.