Technology transforms the whole society

Madhav Chavan “What is happening now is that decisionmaking is being compartmentalised between different departments, divisions, districts and so on. Therefore, a proper network needs to be created that would connect the people to the government directly. A desire to accomplish unity of purpose and an integrated approach is imperative,” says Madhav Chavan. He shares his thoughts and experiences on Child rights and the way ICTs can be mainstreamed in child rights programmes with Reeshma Nair of OneWorld South Asia.” What has been the policy approach to the development problems faced by the children so far? The approach of the government and the policy makers to the issue of child rights has been a fragmented one. The issue of child rights falls under different departments of the government, resulting in more provisions for children in some departments and less in the others. The geographical unevenness is a reality as it is with all development indicators and delivery mechanisms. There is also the larger issue of weak systems for the poor and the lack of a common support system for all Indian citizens. For example, the goal of public health system is to have a good health system for all, which anybody can access through Insurance mechanisms and so on. However, the health system in our country is very poor and children are the most affected by it. So, the challenge is to create a system that is effective and equally accessible to all. How do you rate the legislations undertaken so far? What kind of impact have they had on child development? What do you think is lacking? Any legislation has two aspects – one is the formulation and the other is implementation. Several lacunae exist and we could do with better legislations. There is also a serious problem in the delivery mechanisms. The implementation of current legislations is also not very effective. For example the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). If it was implemented more effectively, the positive outcomes of such programmes could have been far reaching. Another issue to be addressed is that of democracy versus technocracy. Even if one intends to initiate changes, implementation of any project requires one to go through bureaucratic procedures, from the state agencies, to the district council and finally to the village. Should one follow the democratic procedures or should you create an agency that will just take care of it? Citing another example for childcare and the associated health facilities, the pertinent question that one can raise is that who should run the hospitals specialising in childcare? Should all the hospitals be state government run or should it be run professionally, independent of the government? These are larger issues that we would need to struggle with for a long time. So in the context where the government has failed to a large extent, do you see a role for civil society organisations? The people at the grassroots or in the backward and remote areas need to be informed about the various alternatives that exist. The NGO’s and the corporate sector could take a lead in this process. For example, programmes like Pratham’s ‘Learning to read’ or ITC’s e-choupal demonstrate the possibilities that exist. Unfortunately, we remain trapped in the pilot model mode. We don’t create models that are scalable or replicable. There are many models coming up now that are scalable especially in the for-profit sector. E-Choupal is one such example. I believe that the civil society certainly has a role in building capacities of the people. For example, raising literacy levels of the women at grassroots levels is a huge capacity building exercise. Building capacities of the people is something absolutely different, which will happen through village meetings and people’s participation in analysing what they are getting. This is where the issues of governance and right to information become relevant. People must be made aware of their right to information without having to ask and do not need to run from pillar to post. Technology has great potential, more so, given that it is immune to class and caste differences. And you see ICTs playing a crucial role? Absolutely! There is no question about it. It will have to play the role of catalyst for leapfrogging into the next century. There is a lot of talk about the adverse effect of ICTs on children for instance the sexual and violent content that is available through the Internet. How do you look at it? Are we saying that Internet is the only source of such information? Which school in India teaches or promotes the use of abusive language? None. But most adolescents use it. It is easy to monitor the use of Internet by children, parent monitors are easily available. So I think that these are trivial issues in a sense. Exposure to violence does not occur through the Internet alone. Such exposure is also possible through other means like movies and the television. A large number of people have CD players and TV’s at home, the availability of which is not restricted to urban areas alone. Thus, to say that the Internet alone is spreading sex and violence in society is incorrect. What do you think can be done to ensure positive usage of ICTs? The first step could be to ensure that such technologies are equally available and accessible to all. I think that technology can transform the whole society and it should be allowed to do so. However, one of the major challenges faced in India is to aggregate content and disseminate it effectively through the Internet. Child labour is an issue that threatens the Indian society. In spite of legislations there is no decrease in this phenomenon. What should be done? As long as we believe that children have to work because their parents are poor, we will never reach to a solution. The logic that children have to work to feed their parents has to be defeated. The other associated myth is that children often drop out of school since they have to fend for themselves. The government, in such cases should provide certain service support system, sensitive to the needs of the parents and children alike. The Rural Employment Guarantee Programme and Food for Work programme serve an example to this. There is presently a dichotomy between the fundamental right to education and allowance for the employment of children in non-hazardous industries. This especially affects children from the less privileged background that cannot afford to enroll into schools, invariably joining the labour force. This problem should be taken up at the policy level and the “rights of the child” need to be defined more categorically/specifically. Making legislations alone is not enough. It’s also important to ensure that these are implemented properly. However, effective implementation also depends largely on local participation. For this a collective effort has to be made to change the prevailing mind-set of the people and insisting that children should be in school. Another problem that arises here is the issue of coordination in a federal system. Can ICTs be used in this context? My belief is that there is a need for an information superhighway for everybody. There needs to be a network from the village up to the centre. What is happening now is that decision-making is being compartmentalised between different departments, divisions, districts and so on. Therefore, a proper network needs to be created that would connect the people to the government directly. A desire to accomplish unity of purpose and an integrated approach is imperative. Tell us briefly about the work that Pratham is doing in the area of child rights. Pratham adopts various approaches to address the issue of child rights. One of it is the area approach or the direct delivery approach programme where we work in mostly urban slums and in very few villages. Here we train and engage local volunteers to train and teach children of different age groups. At some of these slums, we have started a library to which all children have access. We have started balwadis targeting pre-school children and we also take classes to impart reading and writing skills to out- of-school children. Based on our experience of working with children, we have started another programme called the Catalytic Programme. Through this programme, we partner with the government. For example, now we are working with the Madhya Pradesh Government to impart student teaching skills to teachers and working with teachers, as much as possible, to ensure that the number of students able to read and do arithmetic rises across the state. We have worked across 45 districts and 2,50,000 teachers have been trained so far. In the next three months we would be working with various schools in these districts with about 200 volunteers who will go from school to school to encourage, motivate and help students. Pratham also fights against child labour and has freed hundreds of child labourers in Mumbai. We also use ICTs innovatively to promote education. Computer assisted learning is a project we have been engaged in for some time now. Though this is not on a large scale and is not a kind of intervention that Pratham wants to scale up. However, if the donors like the idea and are willing to invest money, we are willing to expand this initiative. What we have created is a sustainable model through user fees. The children or the user are charged a nominal fee. Another programme we are spearheading is called The Interactive Paper Technology. It’s an audio coordinated book material, which would help children in self-learning especially in courses like English. The audio is on a flash cartridge and it has a pad on which the book is kept. There is a sensor pen and by touching with the sensor pen, one can hear the audio of what has been selected. Have you done a pilot study? The process was to start in Thane and New Bombay in the first week of August, but it’s going to get pushed back. Donating used computers is not what we are looking at. It would be appreciated if the corporate sector can share their professional expertise in the area of accounting, information technology, etc. The people at the grassroots need to be made aware of the functioning of these ICT tools. Somebody has to explain and share with them how technologies like Internet, telephone, cell phone, etc., can be used for their benefit. Creative and innovative techniques have to be developed to address this issue. Is it in collaboration with schools? The schools are likely to pay for it. These schools are looking forward to this programme. Teachers like it because it would aid them in teaching and the cost is also quite low. For the cost of one computer, ten sets of these pads would be provided, which can be used by about hundred children. Apart from the above, we also have some health-based programmes that we run through our family. Our computer aided learning and all our ICT initiatives are being handled through Pratham’s siblings or spin-offs like Sanchar Infotech and Mirambaya Health Foundation. The reason behind this is the different costs involved and the need for a different knowledge base. What role do you see for the corporate in the area of child development and more generally in the social service sector?s There are a number of ways in which the corporate sector can contribute apart from contributing money. They can encourage their employees to work as volunteers with various organisations. Two young professional corporate volunteers in each district in the field of education would be highly recommended. We need 1200 people and it is achievable if the corporates also extend their support in this endevour. One just needs to work for six months or a year after which they can be reintegrated into their respective companies. On the technical side, the corporate sector possess a lot of knowledge. Donating used computers is not what we are looking at. It would be appreciated if the corporate sector can share their professional expertise in the area of accounting, information technology, etc. The people at the grassroots need to be made aware of the functioning of these ICT tools. Somebody has to explain and share with them how technologies like Internet, telephone, cell phone, etc., can be used for their benefit. Creative and innovative techniques have to be developed to address this issue. About Madhav Chavan: He is the Co-founder of Pratham Mumbai, India.

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