{
  "id": 9182448,
  "title": "On Sign Language Day, an interpreter recalls a moment on stage with the President",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/22/on-sign-language-day-an-interpreter-recalls-a-moment-on-stage-with",
  "topic": "world",
  "section": "World",
  "published": "2026-09-22T19:08:07.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "The Hindu",
    "slug": "the-hindu",
    "url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/andhra-pradesh/on-sign-language-day-an-interpreter-recalls-a-moment-on-stage-with-the-president/article71496143.ece"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "On Sign Language Day, an interpreter named K.V.L. Suchitra Balakrishna recalled a memorable moment on stage with India's President Droupadi Murmu. In June, Ms. Suchitra stood beside the President at the first convocation of the Central Tribal University of Andhra Pradesh, translating her Hindi-language address into sign language as the Governor, State Education Minister and Union Education Minister were also present. Ms. Suchitra, fluent in five languages including Telugu, Hindi, English, Odia and Bengali, believed her range of languages led to her selection for the assignment. For her, the opportunity marked a culmination of a lifetime dedicated to sign language. Both she and her sister attended the same special school in the 1990s, where Padmaja, deaf, inspired her to challenge school segregation based on disability. Her breakthrough came with a 1996 assignment to choreograph a sign language version of a song for her deaf classmates, sparking her advocacy work. Today, she advocates for the human rights of deaf people, particularly in light of this year's International Day of Sign Languages, marking the World Federation of the Deaf's 75th anniversary and the 20th anniversary of the UN's Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Despite India's shortage of trained interpreters - with only two or three in Visakhapatnam and fewer than ten in Andhra Pradesh against a nation-wide count of under 300 - Ms. Suchitra has focused her efforts on corporate awareness sessions, government school training and annual sessions at NTPC's summer camp for adolescent girls. She urges greater implementation of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, which recognizes sign language as a means of communication for the hearing impaired, but remains largely unimplemented nine years on. She demands respect, not charity, for persons with disabilities.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}