The era of digital revolution begins in Chhattisgarh

President of India launched the Sanchar Kranti Yojna in Chhattisgarh by giving 4G smart phones to two women beneficiaries and a college student. Under this scheme Government of Chhattisgarh will distribute 4G smart phones along with SIM cards and free data to 50 lakh beneficiaries both in rural and urban areas. The smart phones are pre-loaded with an interesting app named Goth, which means conversation in Chhattisgarhi language. Through this app information about various welfare schemes of the Government will be shared with beneficiaries. Information about agriculture, skill development, employment, and education will also be given through the app.

As the name suggests this scheme is likely to bring a communication revolution in remote tribal areas of the State. Easy access to information is empowering. Modern 4G technology and mobile phones will bring information at the fingertips of people. It is likely to be a game changer for the rural masses. Internet will provide access not only to information but also to services. It will open the gates of Digital India to them. Government is already providing e-services in many areas including land records, tax administration, birth, death and caste certificates, payment of utility bills etc. All these services will become readily available to the people on the smart phone platform. This is, however, only the beginning. Already the private sector is abuzz with the possibility of new apps and startups based on smart phones and Internet connectivity. Apps for e-learning, telemedicine, access to markets both for selling farm produce and buying household items etc. are all being developed. I have myself participated in the development of app which not only provides translation service between Gondi and Hindi languages but also teaches correct pronunciation of Gondi words.

Earlier, Internet use was limited to those who had knowledge of the English language. In the last few years websites and apps using Hindi and other Indian languages have become common. This has been possible due to the development of Unicode standards. Text-to-speech and speech-to-text features have now made it possible for completely illiterate people to use Internet. Rapid advances in AI will increase this trend and rural women with access to smart phones and Internet will be able to reap the benefits easily.

Smart phones will have a huge impact on greater and better monitoring of Government schemes by the citizen and also to some extent reduction in corruption. People with smart phones can and do take photos and videos of Government schemes and behavior of public officials. These photos and videos have a tendency of going viral. It is well known that transparency increases efficiency and reduces corruption. Louis Brandeis has said sunlight is the best disinfectant. With ever increas

The selection would be done through a selection committee in which would be chaired by Youth Commission chairman. It would have renowned persons from art, literature, culture, education, sports and journalism.ing vigil both on traditional and social media, the smart phone revolution will bring about transparency automatically.

Smart phones in the hands of the rural poor will bring about major development in the field of education and health. School teachers of Chhattisgarh have been using Whatsapp and Facebook for sharing pedagogical, methods, teaching learning activities, class room transactions etc. I am a member of several such groups and the quality of interaction in these groups is of a very high level. I am aware that apps are being developed to monitor performance of school students and share it with their parents on smart phone platforms. Similarly apps for coaching, remedial teaching, training video streaming etc. are across the corner. International institutions have web-portals for on-line courses. It is now possible to communicate with someone halfway across the globe at the flick of a finger and at no cost. Similarly consulting with a doctor, sharing x-rays and other medical images etc. is becoming common. I have recently come across the concept of lab in a suitcase where all common lab tests are performed in rural locations at the door step of the patient and are uploaded on the web-portal with the help of a smart phone for consulting with a doctor located far away in a big city hospital. With the advent of smart phones distances will no longer matter.

Smart phones may have other unintended affects as well. It may help us in the preservation of local folk culture. Music and video can be easily recorded and shared. People have a tendency of taking selfies and recording their own activities. This will surely extend to songs, music, dances, folk theatre, works of artisans etc. Records of folk culture will therefore be made without any formal effort. We may not have a formal database of such recordings but these things have a way of going viral and spreading in popular medium. Good folk artists will be discovered and promoted through this medium. On the other hand smart phones and Internet also have a globalizing effect. People can easily see what others in the world are doing. This can also lead to homogenization and loss of local identities in the long run.

Connectivity on voice calls, via SMS and social media platforms will also help in people organizing for their own welfare. This will surly keep future governments and public functionaries in check. I am aware of at least one NGO which is using blue tooth in feature phones for spreading information and organising people in weekly markets in the tribal areas of Chhattisgarh. They make recordings of a few minutes to half an hour and transmit it over blue tooth in weekly markets. They call it “Bultu Radio”. With 4G networks and smart phones access will become easier and blue tooth will no longer be necessary. We know that many news broadcasts are purely for the Internet these days and their audience in increasing by the day. It is well known that messages over smart phones have played a major role in peoples’ movements all over the World, be it Tahrir square or Jantar Mantar. Once the power of communication is unleashed people will find new uses for it. Government can only consider itself to be an enabler and facilitator. With smart phones and data in the hands of the people Government will slowly but surly going to lose out on its regulatory role.

This may be worrying for the Government in the long run particularly with the possibility of Maoists using the same phones for their own purposes. Security forces are wary of smart phone usage in all terrorist affected areas including J&K. Similarly the police have already started worrying about rumor mongering using social media. It might be a good idea to have a policy in place from the very beginning to take care of these possible evil effects of smart phones and the Internet.

(The writer is a senior IAS officer in Chhattisgarh)