Newspaper Reading in Kannada and English for the Visually Impaired Using Raspberry Pi

Newspapers serve as a window to the outside world and provide information regarding current affairs, social reforms, arts and culture. This is the most critical tool used for obtaining information and gaining knowledge must be available equally to everyone including the visually impaired too. If they get good access to newspapers, they will no longer be embarrassed of not knowing and being underinformed about the news around them. But in today's scenario the visually impaired individuals face a mountain of challenges in accessing printed material. Despite a lot of advancement in digital media, the inability to read them makes the visually impaired a little kept away from the full breadth of information available to all sighted individuals. This paper aims to address this issue by developing a portable, cost-effective and a system which reads aloud making news accessible to all. This system serves as an assistive technology for the visually impaired by integrating image processing, machine learning, optical character recognition (OCR) modules and text to speech (TTS) with user interaction supporting English and Kannada languages. By combining these technologies, the system enhances the overall experience and thus this will serve the visually impaired which will significantly improve the quality of their life.