Andhra Pradesh Government Volunteers Map Every Voter Household for Real-Time Governance
The state of Andhra Pradesh in India is taking a significant step towards real-time governance by deploying volunteers to map every voter household in the region. As part of the government’s efforts to bring governance to the doorsteps of the people, these volunteers called Ward and Village agents are responsible for collecting household information and implementing various welfare schemes.
Equipped with smartphones, biometric readers, and a range of applications, around 2.5 lakh volunteers in Andhra Pradesh are assigned approximately 70 households each with a unique cluster ID. Their main task is to gather data on residents, provide welfare subsidies, and ensure proper implementation of the government’s flagship welfare programs.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, these volunteers even went door to door to identify residents who had smartphones and facilitate the installation of the Aarogya Setu application, which played a crucial role in contact tracing and containing the spread of the virus.
The volunteers, who act as last-mile governance agents, regularly update the information they collect from households using mobile applications. They track various aspects of governance, including survey data, which serves as feedback for the implementation of different schemes.
To ensure accountability and efficiency, GPS sensors are installed on the smartphones of the volunteers. This allows officials to track their daily activities and attendance at village and ward secretariats in real-time through dashboards.
The idea of real-time governance extends beyond these volunteers to other government agents like Anganwadi workers and teachers. They too are required to update mobile applications monitored by the Real-time Governance Society of Andhra Pradesh. This initiative, which originated from former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and retired bureaucrat J. Satyanarayana, represents the logical evolution of governance through the use of information technology.
The state government’s focus on real-time governance gained momentum between 2014 and 2019 under Naidu’s leadership. During this period, Andhra Pradesh mandated the linking of Aadhaar, a unique identification number, with various aspects of daily life to ensure real-time tracking of welfare spending. This led to the creation of e-pragati, a comprehensive database that provided a 360-degree profile of individuals and households based on Aadhaar information.
While this approach aimed to streamline welfare delivery, concerns over privacy and misuse of data emerged. In 2019, workers from the Telugu Desam Party were found to have accessed and used Aadhaar data for election campaigns, prompting the ruling Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) to condemn the privacy violation and file a complaint with the Election Commission of India.
Ironically, the YSRCP is now accused of using welfare data during their door-to-door campaigns for the upcoming elections. Accompanied by ward and village volunteers, YSRCP MLAs distribute pamphlets containing details of direct benefit transfers received by each household and the schemes they have benefited from. This suggests that the Aadhaar model and the 360-degree profiling approach are being adopted in other southern states as well.
Andhra Pradesh’s statecraft, which has been in development for over a decade, has led to the integration of technology and governance. While there are concerns regarding data privacy and political manipulation, the government remains committed to implementing real-time governance as a means to improve service delivery and ensure the effective implementation of welfare schemes.
In conclusion, the Andhra Pradesh government’s innovative use of volunteers and technology to map every voter household highlights its dedication to real-time governance. While this approach has its challenges and controversies, it represents a significant step towards improving welfare and governance in the state.
