Meet Tapaswini Das, Odisha’s First Visually-Challenged Female Administrative Service Officer

Hailing from Odisha’s Chasikanda Village, 23-year-old Tapaswini Das created history by becoming the first visually-challenged female Odisha Administrative Service Officer.

Life has been tough to Odisha’s Tapaswini Das but the 23-year-old woman has never thought of giving. Now, she has created history by becoming the first visually-challenged female Odisha Administrative Service (OAS) officer.

Tapaswini managed to secure the 161st rank in the Odisha Civil Services (OCS) examination, results of which were announced on January 6.

According to media reports, Tapaswini said that her success would inspire differently-abled people to achieve their dreams of getting into administrative services. “I am ready to work for the welfare of my state,” she said.

Only 218 individuals qualified for the exam, which was attempted by over five lakh candidates. What is more inspiring is that Tapaswini appeared for the examination as a general category student, refusing to write her paper under the reservation quota despite her impairment.

Tapaswini did not just clear her exams in the first attempt, but also did it without any external help from coaching classes. Unable to read textbooks, she had scanned the books and converted them to audio files to prepare for the OCS exams.

Born to a retired government employee father Arun Das and teacher-mother Krishna Priya Mohanty, Tapaswini is a resident of the Chasikanda village in Odisha’s Biridi block. She lost her eyesight right after her graduation in 2004.

When she was seven, Tapaswini had lost vision in her left eye and began partially losing vision in her right eye as well. On the doctor's advice, she got operated on, post which she lost her vision completely.

Now, irrespective of the degree of her achievement, Tapaswini believes this is just her first step in the path to success, and not success itself.