Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism 2017

Initiative: Nyaaya
Organization: Explaining India’s Laws
Facebook: @nyaayain
Twitter: @NyaayaIN
Website: www.nyaaya.in

An easy brush with the law

Nyaaya has successfully built India’s first free online repository of every central and state law in the country. Its five-member team believes this portal will help individuals to understand their rights, navigate the laws and reach out to legal experts. The repository has been made available in rudimentary English for greater reach and ease of access, especially for people who have not studied law, to find information on existing laws in India. Within four days of its launch, the website had received 20,000 visitors. As a website trying to explain complex Indian laws, the laws listed on the portal are accompanied with guides and visuals for easier understanding and comprehension. The laws have even been further simplified by relatable and popular examples from everyday life. Nyaaya is an initiative associated with the Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, which works with the government on improving existing laws and drafting better laws, and supported by philanthropist Rohini Nilekani. The portal aims at creating content and promoting democratic debate on laws, with the help of its user communities. At the moment, Nyaaya is extending its website reach by developing content in Hindi and, eventually, in several other regional languages.

Nyaaya has been recognised as a Winner for the year 2017 in the category Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism for creating an online and easy-to-comprehend repository of Indian laws

Initiative: SpeakUp Mobile Application
Organization: Dhwani Rural Information Systems
Facebook: @SpeakUpIn
Twitter: @SpeakUp_IN
Website: www.speak-up.in

Speak up and be heard

SpeakUp mobile app is India’s first one-stop feedback platform to reach out to government officials and offices to make a suggestion or share a compliment. The idea is to create a hasslefree communication channel that integrates social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Emails. The initiative recognises that several government departments, ministries and banks have special cells dedicated for public grievances under Twitter Seva. However, the microblogging site has only about 29 per cent user penetration in India; and has largely been used by a very niche audience. The people who are online but not on Twitter are often not aware of appropriate handles through which they can voice their grievances. This is where SpeakUp comes into the picture. It leverages the power of social media, especially Twitter, to reach out to the right person at the right place at the right place. Speak Up intends to revolutionise the age-old grievance system and connect the service provider to the service consumer through an efficient platform for instant communication. In future, the platform intends to bring all categories of vendors and service providers under a common platform and leverage social media to connect them efficiently and easily to their consumers.

SpeakUp Mobile Application has been recognised as a Winner for the year 2017 in the category Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism for creating better communication systems between the public and the government

Initiative: The Cultural Mapping Project
Organization: Sahapedia
Facebook: @Sahapedia
Twitter: @sahapedia
Website: www.sahapedia.org

Communities collaborate to map their culture

The Cultural Mapping Project by Sahapedia is a dynamic digital resource, which records native, settler and colonial history of the island space of Fort Kochi and Mattancherry in Kerala, India, to make it available for use to those who engage with this landscape. The resource is available in the form of a geo-tagged map, with more than 150 sites marked on the basis of their cultural importance, which have been identified and documented in collaboration with local communities. The site is then divided into categories like Cultural Centres, Places of Worship, Lifestyle, Public Spaces, Public Institutions and Heritage Sites. As a public resource, the project has been envisaged to serve multiple purposes. It is a resource for tourists and visitors to access information on the extraordinarily rich cultural landscape of the area. The map provides a space for those who live and work in the area to enunciate their living experiences and offer multiple perspectives of the region. Further, as a first of its kind in India, the Cultural Mapping Project works as a model for future cultural mapping projects. It’s digital mapping of heritage allows new stakeholders — such as town planners, creative developers or entrepreneurs with new business models — to enter the scene, build upon old structures and use the region’s past to improve its present and future. The website was launched in collaboration with the international contemporary art festival, the Kochi-Muziris Biennale.

Sahapedia has been recognised as a Winner for the year 2017 in the category Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism for culture and history mapping through digital technology.

Initiative: Samvidhan LIVE! The Jagrik Project
Organization: ComMutiny- The Youth Collective
Facebook: @5thSpace
Twitter: @5thspace
Website: www.5thspace.in/

Transforming citizens into conscious citizens

Samvidhan LIVE! The Jagrik Project is an initiative that aims to enable young people to experience the implementation of the Constitution of India in our everyday lives. The initiative has successfully engaged 500 young jagriks — an amalgamation of the words ‘jagruk’ meaning aware and ‘nagrik’ meaning citizens —aged between 16-30 across 15 states of India. The minds behind the project believe that ownership of public spaces is a crying need of the hour and that ownership, as a conscious process, cannot be achieved in classrooms. There is a need to take it to the streets. Therefore, through this public initiative, young people experienced and lived the six Fundamental Rights and Duties over a period of five weeks so that they could built their capacities and refl-act (reflect + act) in the real world. With the intention of involving more youngsters in refueling a conversation around the Indian Constitution, Samvidhan Live carried out a survey of responses from 7,000 Indian citizens that will be presented to President Pranab Mukherjee in form of a short film. This initiative is a collaboration between ComMutiny – The Youth Collective and about 30 other youth-led and youth-engaging partners from across the country, and has been supported by the likes of Misereor, Oxfam India and DKA Austria.

Samvidhan LIVE! The Jagrik Project has received a Special Mention for the year 2017 in the category Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism for engaging youth to promote better understanding of the Constitution.

Initiative: Police Awam Saath Saath
Organization: Morango Films
Facebook: @policeawamsaathsaath
Twitter: @policeawam
Website: www.morango.net

In you, we trust

Police Awam Saath Saath is a mass communication campaign aimed at building public and policy support for the Pakistan Police; and to bridge the gap between the police and the public. The campaign aims to communicate the circumstances in which the police department operates and how the public and government role is predominately crucial for effective law enforcement, especially at a time when the country is dealing with the crucial threat of terrorism and a rising level of mistrust against the police department. The campaign has three major objectives: to build greater understanding of the constraints under which the police operate, thereby build greater appreciation for their efforts among citizens; to showcase and highlight best practices being implemented by individual police officers across the country to encourage wider adoption of local best practices; and to affect real improvements in police effectiveness by stimulating bottom-up pressure for reforms and providing a public platform to debate and discuss challenges and constraints. To achieve these objectives, the content of the campaign revolves around showcasing the real life stories of the Pakistan Police, providing an outlook on the life and activities of an ordinary Pakistani policeman, and engaging the public and the police for open dialogues to address real life challenges and misconceptions.

Police Awam Saath Saath has received a Special Mention for the year 2017 in the category Communication, Advocacy & Development Activism for its work on bettering public-police relationships