Data Stories

India has always been a land of paradoxes. This is a cliche, and yet cliches exist because they are true. It is true for the reasons that everyone talks about — India’s 25% illiteracy paired with the world’s second-largest pool of trained engineers, the widespread use of bullock carts in…

Change is a buzz word these days. Every other app and tech product want to change the world for better. This desire to change the world is great, but the million dollar question is whether the most sophisticated and advanced technology can actually succeed in making the change we want…

How do we make India’s poor richer? Before policymakers tackle India’s most important question, they need to answer two more basic questions: How many poor are there? And who are they? Identifying the poor is the first crucial step in designing India’s anti-poverty programs. Since Independence, India has used a…

Though it produces surplus food, India is home to the largest undernourished population in the world. While the production of rice and wheat has grown consistently since Independence, the growth in pulse production has stagnated. (Pulse refers to dried peas, beans, lentils, chickpeas, and other legumes.) As a result, India…

This blog is Part 2 in our series on population dynamics. Check out Part 1 on visualizing aging population here. In this blog, we take a closer look at how India and Japan are aging, and uncover an astonishing trend through population pyramid visualizations. There has been a lot of…

This blog is Part 1 in our series on population dynamics. In this blog, we look at the world’s aging population using a fun visualization and the factors that lead up to aging population. (All finished? Check out Part 2 here.) 33% of Japan’s population is over 60 years of…

As four states go to the polls this year, millions of Indians will cast their votes and participate in the most fundamental aspect of democracy. But, for many of them, this will be their only taste of democracy this year. After votes are counted, the elected officials will be left…

At SocialCops, we have filed hundreds of Right to Information (RTI) requests with the national and state governments. The Ministry of Earth Sciences’ response to our RTI request stood out from the stack of responses we receive. Here’s why. Of our most recent 50 RTI responses, 34 notified us that our…

In February, the Ministry of Railways announced the Railway Budget 2016-17. This continued a 95-year-old tradition where, like an aperitif before the main course, the budget for the Indian Railways is always announced before the Union Budget. An entire day in Parliament dedicated to railway finance is no quirky British…

Less than 6.7% of the Indian Railways’ employees are female. These missing women pose a major challenge to the company’s message of progress. The Indian Railways is bounding forward with modern advancements. It plans to use Twitter to issue customer complaints, an app for booking paperless tickets, handheld terminals for ticket examiners, a Google…

“And at the moment of contact, they do not know if the hand that is reaching for theirs belongs to a Hindu or Muslim or Christian or Brahmin or untouchable or whether you were born in this city or arrived only this morning or whether you live in Malabar Hill…

The Delhi Metro started with one line running between Shahdara and Tis Hazari. Today it stands as one of the most lucrative metro systems in India, aspiring to 12 lines covering 230 km and 160 stations. This is nothing short of commendable. However, one must wonder — what does it…

We know from a quick glance at this map that the issue of farmer suicide in Karnataka is widespread and current. With some geographical knowledge, we also know the situation is worse in Mandya, Haveri, Tumakuru, and Mysuru. However, we are left with more unknown than known, and more questions than…

Every day in the 40 weeks that a mother bears a baby in her womb is a lifetime. A mother’s body goes through numerous psychological, emotional, and physical changes while she is raising a life within her. To imagine that approximately 2,000 expecting mothers’ hopes are shattered each day because…

While the debate rages around the travesty of justice in the Salman Khan hit and run case, the prolonged case has put a spotlight on the menace of drunk driving. Earlier in 2015, a Supreme Court Committee issued guidelines recommending jail term for drunk driving offenders. Also, with the 2015…

A boy goes to the ration store to buy dal and rice. A small farmer sprays fertilizers on his crop. A mother fills her water jug at the community tap. A family purchases kerosene to light their house. For India’s poor, government subsidies are crucial to maintaining a certain minimum…

The automotive industry has long been seen as a laggard in terms of technological progress. Compliance with safety regulations and the capital intensive nature of R&D and production means that innovation cannot be as rapid as in the IT industry, for instance. However, the changes that make it through are…

HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) and AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) have had the misfortune of being associated with more stigma than they deserve. This very impenetrable wall of myth and stigma around the disease has made treating the condition and curbing its spread an exhausting challenge for the world organizations and…

This post is the third post in our Decoding Open Data series. It provides context around the Census – how it was created, how it is conducted, and how it has developed over time.  Read the previous posts here: We Bet You Don’t Know Why the Indian Census Was Created, Why Did…

Road safety in India is a matter of great concern, given that a person dies every 4 minutes on our roads. In 2015, the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) put road accident numbers at over 4,50,000, resulting in 1,41,526 deaths and 4,77,731 injuries. With the government’s proposed Road Transport and…

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. If that’s the case, then a data visualization is worth a million words. Or data points. This map showing the 1860 election results of the U.S. has been drawn and redrawn numerous times over the years, but it does more than…

The Indian Railway is India’s largest employer and among the top ten employers in the world. It has differing meanings in the lives of Indians. For 25 million people, it is the mode of transport to take them to work and home. For industries that make up 1 million tonne…

Today is the World Mental Health Day, a day dedicated to raising awareness of mental health issues around the world. Here are 4 striking infographics that will help raise awareness about this issue, which is a leading cause of stigma and suicides in India. 1. India is the most depressed…

This is the second post in our Decoding Open Data series. It provides context around the Census – how it was created, how it is conducted, and how it has developed over time. Read the other posts here: We Bet You Don’t Know Why the Indian Census Was Created, Why Did…

This post is the first post in our Decoding Open Data series. It provides context around the Census – how it was created, how it is conducted, and how it has developed over time.  Read the other posts here: We Bet You Don’t Know Why the Indian Census Was Created, Why…

During an event, the founder of an NGO working with migrant labourers was asked how her approach to care had evolved over the years. In reply, she described how she used to give away high-quality personal care products without realising that they were not impacting the beneficiaries’ quality of life…

India has been trying to tackle the problem of population through improved use of family planning methods since before the Emergency rattled the political system. Family planning and contraception methods attack the very root of beliefs of several major sections of the Indian society, and hence the issue of population…

Public Health: Current Situation and Opportunities India spends $252 million every year on tuberculosis control and management. But 278,000 lives are lost each year despite the onerous efforts to curb the disease. Where do the doctors fail? What do the DOTS clinics do wrong? Or is it only because people do…

There are over 1.4 million schools in India. With different kinds of schooling systems and a multitude of “school” types – government owned schools, central government schools, state government schools, low cost private schools, private schools – it was almost impossible to track school performance, utilization of funds and other important parameters. And,…

The Labour Ministry has recently finalized the amendments to the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment (CLPRA) Bill, which proposes complete prohibition of employment of children up to the age of 14 years while banning employment of children between 15-18 years in hazardous works. We all have seen children working…