D Akshay Kumar lost his eyesight completely when he was in class 6. There were symptoms since his birth but by the moment, things could be rectified, it was too late to sort out the woes. But that wasn’t the end of his life. He believed that he could do something beyond human imagination to show that there is a life after losing vision.
When life threw all challenges at him, he didn’t go into a shell and curse his fate but instead he single-handedly managed to sail through all the challenges. In school days, there were only fewer pages in textbooks. With the help of software, Kurzweil, it was a bit easier for him to convert from the text to speech.
Akshay developed a habit of studying by listening to audios, the only beneficial thing that lifted his confidence level and other than that, he got complete support from his mother, K Selvakumari who is a teacher at a government school in Chennai. She made sure that her son came through his school exams with flying colours. “While in school, books had less pages and it was easier for the software (Kurzweil) to convert the text into speech,” Akshay said.
He had gone from strength to strength when he secured 92% in his Class XII CBSE exams. Right from using match-sticks on a chart to geometrical designs to scanning books and turning them into audio files, Akshay’s mother gave absolutely everything until her son finished school.
After completing his schooling, Akshay went to law university. “At law school, scanning was tedious due to the number of pages,” says Akshay. But thanks to his classmates who non-stoppingly sent exam preparation material for the past five years through voice notes on a whatsapp group.
The 22-year-old Akshay, who is a final year student of five-year course in law and commerce credits his success to his friends who took up the role in Akshay’s difficulties.”I would say Akshay is gifted to have got friends like them. They have been patient so far and have been of immense help,” Selvakumari said.
Akshay is waiting for his final semester results, where he has maintained an aggregate score of 71% by far. He has plans to pursue PG in law and then mark his presence for the UPSC exams. He admits that he is a big fan of A.R. Rahman.
He has shown interest in music where he has sailed through grade 4 exams for keyboard from Trinity College in London. His favourite one is ‘My heart will go on’ from Titanic which he plays often, but the song that fits his story best is the Beatles’ “I get by with a little help from my friends.”
