Mobile phones empower women

Is using a mobile phone a symbol of independence? Is it a simple tool of communication or a medium that provides rights? Why do women lag behind among those who use cellphones? Why do women have to take permission from men before buying a mobile phone that connects them to the world out there? The…

Information play in villages

What is the cost of information, or the lack of it? For some, it is a life, for some other, a monthly pension, and for yet another, the monthly subsidized ration. In India, millions of people lose their rights, entitlements, assets, education, pension, wages, food and water, land and livestock, housing, medicine, health and access…

Community radio can be rural ISP

The people in Gop block in Odisha have something more powerful than anyone else in the country has—an FM community radio station (CRS) called Radio Namaskar with a licence to broadcast using a 50-watt transmitter, enough to cover a 20km radius. Sometime in 2011, the local community heard jingles about the government’s integrated child development…

Technology and public libraries

Libraries are the life blood of a nation. This is particularly true for a country such as India, which has a large number of young people aspiring for a better life. Yet, our public libraries are grossly neglected. Each one of the country’s 676 districts has at least one public library, an enormous resource that…

Indian farmers in the IT age

According to the Census of India 2011, there are 118.9 million cultivators across the country, or 24.6% of the total workforce of over 481 million. The proportion was about 50% in 1951. On the other hand the number of people working as agricultural labourers has increased from 19% in 1951 to 30% in 2011, standing…