Covid-19: Google helps ‘saathis’ share credible health info in rural India

We are helping female internet “saathis” (or trainers) share authoritative health advice with their networks in rural villages in India, says the company

As Covid-19 pandemic affects all sections of the society, Google said that its focus in the on-going crisis in Asia Pacific has been on prioritising three things: contributing to the immediate health response, helping people learn and work from home and supporting the small businesses most affected. The company said in a statement late Tuesday that in India, it is helping female internet “saathis” (or trainers) share authoritative health advice with their networks in rural villages.

“Our team in India has helped local governments share the location of night and food shelters on Google Maps,” said Scott Beaumont President, Asia Pacific. Google started showing the locations of Covid-19 test centres on Google Maps, Search and Assistant in Indonesia, before extending the feature to other countries around the world, including India, Korea and the Philippines.

ALSO READ: Apple, Google ban GPS tracking in apps using contract tracing framework

In Korea, the Google News Initiative is offering weekly sessions training journalists on how to identify misinformation. The Covid-19 pandemic began spreading across Asia Pacific in January, affecting millions of people directly. Google said that learners from disadvantaged backgrounds are more likely to have their schooling disrupted and their progress held back…Read Full Story

Rural India open defecation free? Not quite, shows NSO survey report

Around 71.3 per cent of rural households and 96.2 per cent of urban households had access to toilets during 2018, according to the survey

More than one-fourth of households in villages have no access to toilets, according to the latest official survey conducted by the National Statistical Office (NSO).

Around 71.3 per cent of rural households and 96.2 per cent of urban households had access to toilets during 2018, according to the NSO’s “Drinking Water, Sanitation, Hygiene and Housing Condition in India” report, released on Saturday. The survey was conducted between July and December last year. The findings have come more than a month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi declared rural India to be open defecation-free (ODF).

According to the survey, a household has access to a toilet if a majority of its members has the facility of using it. This included toilets exclusively used by households, commonly used in the same building, or public-use toilets with or without payment.

The National Democratic Alliance government in 2014, by launching the Swachh Bharat Mission, had set a target of making rural areas open defecation-free by October 2 this year, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. A target was to “provide access to toilet facilities to all rural households in the country”.

“Today, rural India has declared itself ‘open defecation-free’. This is the strength and proof of success of the Swachh Bharat Mission. We are getting appreciated and awarded for providing toilets to over 660 million people in 60 months by building 110 million toilets in five years,” Modi said at a function in Gujarat on October 2 this year.

Two data sets presented in the survey report — household access to toilets and benefits received from government schemes on sanitation — were at the heart of a disagreement between the NSO and the government on the official survey results, leading to a six-month delay in the release of the report…Click Here