Lakshmi, 50, lives in California, USA and always wears stylish saris. She gets them from Babu in India. You might picture Babu as a tech savvy, new-age entrepreneur. But the reality is stark different. He is an illiterate weaver who just knows a few basic functions in his smart phone. He can photograph his saris and WhatsApp them to his customers and based on their request, ship them.
For long, literacy has been considered essential for digitalisation. However, the work of Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF) has proved otherwise. Founded by Osama Manzar, this organisation is striving to remove all barriers in attaining digitalisation for all. The foundation’s mission and vision are simple: last mile connectivity and creating access through digitalisation.
Osama is a man of passion. He set up DEF after struggling through an undergraduate degree and living in a slum for several years before getting a job in a computer magazine. “When I got this job, the only two related words I knew were hardware and software,” remembers Osama. This helped him realise the potential of skilling.
From a sweeper to hardware expert
Babloo Das, joined DEF as a sweeper. He couldn’t read or write but gradually learnt everything about hardware and its engineering aspects. An accomplished hardware and Wi-Fi engineer, today, Babloo can repair any kind of personal computer. Illiteracy didn’t stop him but he still communicates by sending and receiving voice messages or video messages to his clients. “This is the capability of our people. They are highly skilled and illiteracy is not a barrier to train them. We call people like Babloo, digital social entrepreneurs who are functionally skilled and digitally literate,” pointed Osama.
According to DEF, digital inclusion is very poor in India. Design interventions are done mainly in English and meant for the literate. DEF has shown a new model, where literacy or the lack of it is not a barrier to digital empowerment. Usage of digital products is taught through audio-visual aids and symbols. Through constant practice, the functional aspects are familiarised. A women self-help group who run micro and nano business, learnt major apps in smartphones that helped them to take photos, scan documents and also to do online transactions. Just by recognising the visual rich icons and through practice these women have been able to do sales online.
2000 resource centres…
DEF was not deterred by the pandemic. In fact, the lockdown sent them into overdrive. Case studies across India pointed to the need to upskill women entrepreneurs through financial literacy and strategic planning. Based on this, the organisation started to focus on digital literacy, internet literacy and financial literacy amongst others. The organisation has matched the resilience of its women entrepreneurs by being equally resilient during the pandemic in tackling information literacy.
Osama is proud of DEF’s Community Information Resource Center (CIRC), which act as the nodal point within villages. Currently there are 2000 centres in 135 districts across 24 states. About 70 per cent of the SoochnaPreneurs or information entrepreneurs who run these CIRCs are women and they were all functionally illiterate and had never touched any digital device earlier. However today, they offer digital services in the areas of education, health, finance, business, agriculture, and livelihood.
Demything mental models
One may be familiar with the term mental models, popularised by Peter Senge’s book The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. It is the deeply ingrained assumptions or generalizations that influences one’s understanding of the world and the actions they take based on that.
For a long time, people believed that literacy was essential to digitilization. DEF has disproved this mental model with its work. By choosing the most unconnected areas and illiterate women and offering them with digital resources, they have created a social revolution. DEF has created a platform for a truly democratic world through design thinking and common sense approach. May they thrive.
