Paul D’Souza Invents an affordable Life-Changer device Touche for Visually-Challenged
Today, we are exorbitantly depended on the digital lifestyle, without it, we can’t even think to sustain and communicate with each other.
Imagine, you need to live a digital-less day with no access to social networks and browsing! You probably can’t think of, right?
But, there are some people who need special attention, you need to read the data loudly and they require special books to read the simple words, talking about visually impaired people who have to face the challenges in every part of life.
A freelancer Bengalurean, Paul Gerald D’Souza who has invented many devices to help visually challenged persons.



Images credit: New Indian Express
Paul D’Souza’s career as an inventor began when he designed a compact Gherkin Sorting Machine in his mid-20 while working as a software developer for an agro firm.
In past, he has invented horological devices like the Mechanical Perpetual Calendar, Three Large Date Display Mechanisms, and a Differential Escape Mechanism.
His most fascinating invention is the Multi-Line Refreshable Braille Display- a device that will help the visually challenged people to use a computer and this project have won Paul the National Geographic ‘Shaping the Future’ award.
The latest invention is an e-reader for the blind called Touché. It’s a Refreshable Braille Display, has a display area or a window where there are hundreds of small pin-like projections that can be felt like the embossed Braille dots on paper.
“These dots change as the text is being read. The result is a device that could be likened to an e-reader (like the Amazon Kindle) for the blind. Books in text format can be stored on the device or loaded using USB pen drives. The device has WiFi, ethernet and HDMI ports as well. These would be useful for transferring data or software to the machine,” he said.
“With about 10GB internal memory that can be used for a library, it is estimated that between 30,000 and 50,000 books or documents can be easily stored on each device,” he adds, reports New Indian Express.
All it needed was a smart combination of electronic and mechanical principles, many of which the inventor was right to the patent.
The device can now take in digital data, store it in its memory, access it line-by-line and convert it to Braille.
Once refreshed with a simple press of a button, the next set of 20 characters is loaded. With all procedures involved for a line display, refreshing takes less than 100 milliseconds. Touche costs one-tenth of other similar devices.
The device comes with four USB ports and presently it works like an e-reader but Paul plans to include an option of keyboard/ writing or notepad in future.
His invention gives us a great inspiration for helping visually challenged people and provides an excellent leverage for social welfare.