Communicating With Samvaad: Case Study

Knowing Our Client

Ms. Subhi Kakan Singh had recently taken over the Sub-District Magistrate’s office in Sikendrabad, one of the many tehsils of Bulandshahr district in Uttar Pradesh. The oath of an SDM resonates with taking care of their town and its people and there stood a glaring obstacle in the way of her oath.

Acknowledging The Problem

Many departments worked at the ground level below the SDM. Their way of interacting with the common folks was solely through the “Mangalvaar Diwas’ held on Tuesdays. It acted as a Grievance Redressal System which given the population and lack of knowledge bore no fruits.

Acknowledging The Requirements

What our client put forward to us was very straightforward; Bridge the communication gap. The SDM wanted to improve communications between the various departments, between her and the various departments and between the town folks and the department officials.

Our Plan of Action

In our second meeting, we were armed with a prototype which was a basic app with an elementary procedure of logging in by name and phone number, uploading the photo of the incident, marking the area on a map and sending it to the officials.

But we fell flat on ourselves when we learned that there already existed a government app of the same type and we had not done anything innovative!

Coming Up With Samvaad

A little more racking our brains is how we came up with Samvaad. And Why not? Since all the problem was communication so why not build an app that aids directly messaging the SDM and focuses on plain texts rather than over-complicating the situation?

We aimed Samvaad at being a digital directory for the SDM and the people. Anyone can text the SDM with their problems and attach photographs if they wish. The SDM can communicate with any and all departments under her along with the people who send texts to her.

How Was Our Experience?

Working with the government sector was a dream come true. The fact that the day to day problems of even a few thousands is going to change through your humble work is overwhelming. What we also learned is that not to be lazy when it comes to research and not not take things lightly just because they seem easy on the outside. Also criticizing the government with poor facts has become a strict no-no for us.

The Future Of Samvaad

Things don’t stop here. A successful pilot only brings in more responsibility and thirst to better the app. A new version is under the way with new features like making closed groups, sending videos, PDFs and a wish that Samvaad makes its way to other government sectors also.