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India
Some of the biggest decisions in the world use little data, while some don’t use data at all. In December 2016, our co-founder Prukalpa Sankar took the stage at TedX Gateway, Asia’s largest TedX conference, to talk about the importance of data and technology in improving healthcare, crime, governance, urban…
Mapping the Education System in India by Analyzing Data for 1.4 Million Schools
Case Study: SocialCops + Oxfam India from SocialCops India boasts of an incredibly high enrollment rate of children in schools. As per the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2012, 96.5% of all rural children between the ages of 6-14 were enrolled in school. This is the fourth annual survey…
Don’t Make for India. Make for Bharat.
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…
Driving Rapid Development for 290 Villages in Chandrapur
“When you have numbers, figures, and data in front of you, you stop shooting in the dark.” -Ashutosh Salil, IAS, District Collector of Chandrapur In the fall of 2016, Sudhir Mungantiwar, the Honorable Minister of Forest, Finance, and Planning for the Government of Maharashtra reached out to the Tata Trusts.…
Data-Driven Decision Making for Agriculture in India
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…
Giving Thanks for My Job — A Non-Traditional Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving has always been a wonderful, albeit somewhat predictable activity for me — I meet my family, tease my little sisters, eat great food until I hurt, and talk about what I’m thankful for. Once I check all the boxes, I can collapse into a food coma. Thankfulness has always…
A Step-by-Step Guide to the 2011 Census: Its Successes, Failures and Questions
This post is the third post in our Decoding Open Data series. The foundation of this series is our slideshare, which examines the open dataset and provides key insights and analytics about the 2011 Census. Decoding Open Data: 2011 Indian Census from SocialCops These blog posts provide context around the Census…
6 Technological Interventions to Rid India of Corruption
India holds the dubious distinction of ranking 85th among 175 nations surveyed for corruption. The socio-economic price of corruption is very high. So, as India takes its place on the world economic stage, corruption needs to be tackled seriously. On the one hand, the attitude of accepting bribery needs to…
Financial Inclusion: The Last Mile
Gunji, in Uttarkhand – a northern state of India, nestled among the Himalayan Mountains – is a place of spectacular beauty and an equally treacherous terrain. Reaching this idyllic spot located at least 45 km away from a motorable road takes 4 days of challenging trek along the ferocious Kali…
4 Important Infographics on Mental Health
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…
We Bet You Don’t Know Why the Indian Census Was Created
This post is the first post in our Decoding Open Data series. The foundation of this series is our slideshare, which examines the open dataset and provides key insights and analytics about the 2011 Census. Decoding Open Data: 2011 Indian Census from SocialCops These blog posts provide context around the…
Himsagar Fellowship Travelogue: Six States. Five Months. Solo Travel.
Update: We are currently inviting applications for the 2018 cohort of the Data for Impact Fellowship. Learn more and apply here! I remember sitting on what was then my first train journey on the Fellowship – the Mumbai-Delhi Rajdhani on the 4th of January 2015. Winter in Mumbai was at one extreme in…
National Family Health Surveys: The Backbone of Health Policies
Introduction 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…
How Does ASER Measure Learning Outcomes?
The Annual Status of the Education Report (ASER) survey is now an indispensable reference point for education policy making in India. The ASER reports have been regularly cited in Parliamentary proceedings, the National Economic Surveys and the erstwhile Planning Commission’s reports. Several states have started remedial education programs based on…
Launching Viz: Instagram for Dynamic Maps
A few months ago, at SocialCops we had mined through data about 1.4 million schools in India to build a one stop Right to Education dashboard to help decision makers understand how to improve quality of education in their districts and constituencies. A few weeks later, I happened to meet…
Understanding the World’s Largest Learning Outcomes Survey and Its Impact on Education Policy
The Annual Status of the Education Report (ASER) survey is a unique activity for many reasons. Every year, with the help of more than 25,000 volunteers, ASER assesses the basic reading and arithmetic skills of more than 6,00,000 children in the age group of 5-16 years — more than the twice the…
How This Government Project Is Driving Health Care Policy Using Data from the Field
The Indian Healthcare System The healthcare system in India is structurally a complex hierarchy of different government and private agencies at centre, state, district and village levels. Given India’s poor global standing in public healthcare and the nature of bureaucratic information flows, data-driven decision making is being pitched as a…
Work and Travel, Learn and Touch Lives: A Month in the Life of a Himsagar Fellow
Update: We are currently inviting applications for the 2018 cohort of the Data for Impact Fellowship. Learn more and apply here! Yes, I’ve spent the last four months traveling to Bihar, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and Odisha meeting over a hundred NGOs working across a myriad of issues. And yes, I’ve been doing…
Modi-fied: When We Met PMO India
We’re excited to announce that SocialCops was chosen as one of the top 10 emerging startups in India by NASSCOM to meet and speak with the PMO India Narendra Modi, along with other leading startups like: Cash Karo, My Notice Period, News In Shorts, Freshdesk, Table Grabber, Komli, Wingify, Rolocule. Shout out…
Is Our DISE Education Data Failing Us?
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,…
Statistics On Child Labor: Will The New Law Change Anything?
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…
Is It Uber Taxi’s Fault, or Should the Indian System Share Blame?
In 2012, the high profile Nirbhaya rape case made our nation question women’s safety in public transportation. Back then, the state responded by cancelling over 2,500 permits of contract carriages and chartered buses due to fake address registration. Two years later, the average Delhi woman was feeling safer due to…
Can Narendra Modi’s Swachh Bharat Be Achieved Through Technology?
Swachh Bharat has found its place as a national priority under Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi. The task is enormous and will require change in individual behavior as well as transformation in sanitation infrastructure and capabilities. Technology can be an enabler in this process by providing tools, processes, and structures to make cleanliness and sanitation…
Why I Left My Swanky Westin Office to Work in Client Management for Grassroots India
College kids – a naïve bunch of youngsters that run purely on skill, caffeine, and an insatiable hunger to make a mark. It’s been 3 months since I officially graduated — not long enough for me to be overcome by the cynicism that all those preceding me have succumbed to; not…
Achieving the Swachh Bharat Mission: Two Tried-and-True Models for Change
On Oct 2nd, 2014, PM Narendra Modi launched the Swachh Bharat Mission, a clarion call for citizens to participate in the process of creating a clean India. Narendra Modi’s words echoed the vision that we have been striving towards at SocialCops. We’ve always called for citizens to stop complaining and start contributing. In…
Why We Do What We Do: Our Learnings From a Pilot Study in Taoru
Be the change you wish to see in the world. A few years ago, I read this quote while walking and holding the hand of the children I used to teach. It struck me so deeply that it has kept me going to this day. Change is a long process – one…
A Well-Built Public Toilet With No Access To Water: The Indian Development Dilemma
The beauty of working at a startup lies in the fact that in some way, you get exposed to every aspect of the business. As the data sciences lab intern, my job essentially involves analyzing and visualizing social data. However, on day 5, after my daily religious cup of chai…
What It’s Like to Work at SocialCops
I started to work for the young and vibrant SocialCops team as a Partnerships lead about two months ago. I came on board at a time when SocialCops was in its early phase of expansion after a few successful pilots. It’s been one hell of a experience to be on the SocialCops…
What the “God of Cricket” Sachin Tendulkar Taught Us About Building a Startup
This 24th of April, the team at SocialCops would like to celebrate Sachin Tendulkar. It has been a few months since India’s biggest sporting icon bid us farewell. After a brief period of uncertainty, Indian cricket has moved on. In a country which has a habit of finding heroes, it has not taken…
Why We Do What We Do
Doing startups for the money is not a great idea. Perhaps doing startups to be remembered or become famous is a better motive. Perhaps not. A better motive still would be a desire to change the world. We believe that the only good reason to do a startup is because…