Call for the establishment of authorities to implement the Marrakesh Treaty Accession

Bengali language still lacks high resolution text to speech applications. Braille Audio and Wipo supported Daisy Publish is already geared up to overcome that barrier to make published books readable. To make the benefits of these technologies available to the authors-publishers and readers, the sector concerned have urged the establishment of a national authority and programs on this soon.

The Visually Impaired People's Society (VIPS) has demanded the establishment of a digital accessible library of e-books so that the visually and hearing impaired can also read books at the same time and cost.

Novelist and science writer Mohammad Zafar Iqbal expressed his happiness while speaking as the chief guest, “I am happy with the signing of the Marrakesh Agreement. Best of all, we can translate books for the visually impaired without any assistance. It is a humanitarian agreement. So we have to prepare before the law comes in action”.

VIPS General Secretary Md. Jahangir Alam moderated the program while the Registrar of Copyrights Md. Daud Mia, Vice President of Shahjalal Islami Bank Imam Hossain Gazi, Lawyer Mosharraf Bhuiyan and former Registrar of Copyrights Zafar Raza Chowdhury spoke among others.

Bhaskar Bhattacharya, National Consultant (Accessibility) of a2i, a multimedia talking book developer in Bengali language, presented the keynote in this seminar titled ‘Marrakesh Treaty Accession and Way Forward with Publishers, Writers and Journalists’.

In his speech, Md Daud Mia said, according to the Marrakesh Agreement, there will be no legal barriers in the country in customizing any format suitable for reading for the visually and hearing impaired. He said that the proposed law will be passed before next June.

Former Registrar of Copyrights Zafar Raja Chowdhury urged to take appropriate measures to spread incentives and soft tools among everyone to encourage reading of books for the visually impaired.

VIPs Joint Editor Masood Anwar Khan Miraj expressed his gratitude to all those who attended the event.