Inside an odourless laboratory, Chanchal is engrossed in work. The countertops and shelves are lined with bottles of perfumes. From time to time, the 28-year-old picks up a thin strip of paper from a tray, sprays it with fragrance from one of the bottles and smells it with concentration for a minute or so. Then she turns to the computer next to her, keys in something, and moves on to another strip, another perfume.

Chanchal is an assistant perfume evaluator with the Indian arm of a British fragrance company in Mumbai. She is also blind.

Ever since she got the job five months ago, Chanchal has been doing this 60-kilometre each way commute from Ulhasnagar to Lower Parel five days a week. She claims she has found job satisfaction that eluded her when she worked at a call centre close to her home. "People were so indifferent there. Here, everyone treats me with respect. I am much better at my job than many of my sighted colleagues. Is job se khud ka ek status ban gaya hai (This job has given me a newfound status)."

India's 15 million blind are often left to fend for themselves despite the fact that there are laws that make it mandatory for government agencies to reserve at least three per cent jobs for people with disabilities. There are positions opening up in the private sector but whether these jobs actually do justice to the skill-set of a differently-abled person remains to be seen.

Initially, fragrance companies also recruited the blind out of charity. But it did not take them long to figure out that blind employees have a heightened olfactory sense which they could put to use, a fact that has always been known but has now been empirically proven. A 2012 study published in the online journal Perfumer & Flavorist claims "the blind and visually impaired group were more than twice as likely to pass the industry standard smelling test as the normally-sighted control group".

The natural advantage, however, does not preclude training. And so, the Blind Persons Association of India and the multinational company, CPL Aromas International, decided to come up with a structured training programme.

Renuka Thergaonkar, head of the cosmetology and perfumery department at Mumbai's V.G. Vaze College was among those who designed the course offered at the College of Fragrance for the Visually Impaired - a non-profit initiative.

At the College of Fragrance, selection happens after an "admission test" in which candidates have to establish that they recognise certain basic odours. Successful candidates then have to undergo a year's training. According to Thergaonkar, who has authored a book in Braille titled Introduction to Perfume, the course covers a lot of ground - psychology, communication, food tasting and, of course, a lot of exposure to all kinds of smells. Technology training includes the use of a software called JAWS (Job Access With Speech), basic documentation in computers and e-mailing.

Alladin Sheikh and Ravi Vanniyar were identified by the Blind Persons Association of India and enrolled in the intensive course.

Sheikh, who was born blind, has been working as a technical trainee at perfumers S.H. Kelkar for the past two years. He says, "I used to run a PCO before this. But phone booths went out of fashion and I was out of work." Vanniyar, who lost his eyesight due to a smallpox infection in childhood, checks quality in another fragrance firm, Anthea Aromatics. He was a hawker at a railway station.

Rita Rego, manager, human resources and administration at CPL Aromas India is full of praise for her blind colleagues. She says, "They are deeply focused, unbiased and undistracted while evaluating a fragrance."

Now, that's a whiff of fresh air.