Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh on Wednesday directed the state administration to clear the backlog of jobs for the visually impaired.

At present, there is a backlog of 163 jobs kept for the physically challenged, an official statement said.

It said the Chief Minister, who presided over a meeting here, directed the backlog of 65 jobs for the visually impaired should be cleared soon.

The meeting decided to relax some qualification norms, particularly for teaching posts in the state's Education Department, for the physically challenged.

The statement said that after 1996, a total of 1,750 posts kept for the physically challenged were filled, of which 554 were for the visually impaired.

On the plea of the visually impaired to select them on the basis of a Braille test, Social Welfare Secretary Anuradha Thakur said a decision in this regard would be taken after consulting the National Federation of the Blind in New Delhi.

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