While International Women’s Day is observed annually on March 8 to recognize and celebrate the achievements of women, only restricting it to one day isn’t merely possible. While celebrating many significant achievements women have been a part of, one saga worth sharing is of Devangi Dalal, an audiologist, speech-language pathologist, and one of the founders of the Josh Foundation, for her work to provide free hearing aids to underprivileged children.
Talking about some of her prominent achievements, Dalal has gained public attention as a result of her work with young children who have hearing impairments. In 2012, she became the first Indian to receive the American Academy of Audiology’s Humanitarian Award. In 2019, she also received the Women Influencers Award. She has a long record of achievements dating back to the start of her professional career. She served as the Maharashtra Speech & Hearing Association’s executive secretary. a long-time winner of the title of Best Pediatric Hearing Aid Center in India.
Along with this, She also authored the books ‘Chalo Badhirone Sambhalta Kariye’ in Gujarati, and ‘Kuch Suna Aapne’ in Hindi, for the hearing-impaired and also directed a 17-minute telefilm to create awareness of hearing impairment. She just didn’t stop here during the covid-19 lockdown period when people were suffering from physical and mental health issues, she decided to write to spread a wave of positivity. During this period she wrote the book “Spreading Positivity” in English and “Jagyatyarthi Sakaraatmakta” in Gujarati.
Through Josh Foundation. she has made consistent efforts to help the children and spread awareness about hearing impairment. She has actively organized and participated in events where she can spread awareness about hearing-impaired children, the challenges they face and what is the best course of treatment. Dalal’s main objective is to help and support kids who have hearing issues and make them equally inclusive in our society. Her foundation has distributed over a thousand hearing aids to children and has successfully been able to provide children in 12 schools with 100 percent digital hearing aids. She believes that ‘the world will aspire to the beauty of kindness if we make these specially abled children equally inclusive in our society.’
Her constant efforts and courage in accepting challenges to give a new life to people suffering from this unseen disability have made her reach to International platform. Devangi Dalal is appointed as the First Advocate for Hearing Health from India, by Coalition for Global Hearing Health (CGHH), working with WHO to promote public awareness about hearing health. She has been instrumental in collecting funds to the tune of more than Rs 4.5 Crore so far, to support these hearing-impaired children. With the aim of bringing about a change in society on how hearing and speech-impaired children are viewed and treated, the mother of two children feels that her journey has just begun and there is a long way to go.
