Disabled Women Challenging Stereotypes

Nelufar Hedayat unites two women with disabilities from Toronto and Mumbai, who are challenging misconceptions about their sexuality and what they’re capable of achieving.

Maayan Ziv is a fashion photographer and entrepreneur from Toronto, Canada. She uses a wheelchair and became frustrated with the lack of information about accessibility of venues in her city. Having discovered early on that technology can alter the day to day life of disabled people all over the globe, she decided to develop an app. It is called AccessNow and uses crowd-sourcing technology to create an accessible map of a city. It's now operational in 35 countries around the world.

Nidhi Goyal is an activist and comedian from Mumbai. At the age of 14 she began to lose her sight, which she maintains allowed her to ‘see more clearly’ the barriers that disabled people face. She is India’s first female disabled stand-up comedian, using humour to challenge the way people think about dating with disability and sexuality. She founded the non-profit Rising Flame which advocates for women with disabilities, and delivers disability and inclusion training to companies across India.

Produced by Katie Pennick for BBC World Service.

Image: (L) Nidhi Goyal Credit: Sahil Kotwani (R) Maayan Ziv