for training the community to access and use digital information available on government portals and websites

Organisation: Samarthan-Centre for Development Support
Initiative: Deepening and Up scaling Accountability and Transparency Tools to Secure Rights and Entitlements
Website: www.samarthan.org
Location: Madhya Pradesh, India

Dekh-Parakh is a citizen led initiative to monitor the rights and entitlements by using the digital platforms to access information, matching it with on-ground reality, and taking corrective actions in the cases of discrepancies.

With digital access to services such as MGNREGS, National Social Security Prigram, PM Kissan Samman Nidhi etc. remaining a challenge — the program trains local youth as ‘Dekh Parakh Saniks’ using their personal smartphones to access, interpret and use digital information available on government portals and websites to track and wrest entitlements, further ensuring transparency and accountability. The process reduces the dependency of the community on district administration for such data.

Samarthan-Centre for Development Support has facilitated the rights and entitlements for thousands of beneficiaries and benefited access of several crores to entitlement holder. Furthermore, it has strengthened the local democracy by changing the power dynamics of community with local administration.