 "New app lets women alert friends, family when in danger")
If you’re a woman living in India, the past few days might have led you to question your safety in the country – be it on the streets, in public places, public transports – and lot of this can be attributed to the recent event in New Delhi that took the nation by shock. The anger following the brutal rape of a 23-year student in a moving bus in Delhi spilled over to its streets, this past weekend, and it is only a grim reminder of the fact that the woman are not safe in the country.
The concept of a mobile phone application is not alien to the progressive working woman in India, and an app now assures that it can help her ‘Fight Back’ – yes, that is what the app is called. The makers of this app claim that now if a woman senses danger, she can alert her family and friends with just the press of a button.
Fight Back using this app (Image credit: Getty Images)
The app has been developed by a mobile VAS provider CanvasM. The way this app works is that it tracks a user’s location and then sends SOS messages to selected contacts during an emergency. Reports quoted CanvasM CEO Jagdish Mitra as saying, “We feel the application can help make a woman feel safe, especially given the current law and order situation. The app allows them to press panic button whenever they feel unsafe. It tracks the location using GPS and alerts the right people.”
Interestingly, CanvasM is currently integrating the solution with the Delhi Police’s back-end IT infrastructure. Mitra believes that this way the Delhi Police will also receive messages when somebody is in danger and is seeking help, helping them initiate action.
Those in the Delhi-NCR region can avail this app for free, while those elsewhere in the country will be able to avail it for a subscription fee of Rs 100 per annum. Mitra added, “Such incidents are shameful. The application is our way of contributing to make women feel safe."
Considering that a huge chunk of users in the country are non-smartphone users, Mitra shared that there is something coming up for them, too. They will soon have a similar SMS-based application to ensure that even those without smartphones are safe.
The Fight Back app, currently available for Android, BlackBerry and Symbian operating systems, has seen about 3,000-4,000 downloads. Mitra added, “The pick up is there but not as much as we had expected. We have been busy with building the ecosystem. We will now work on spreading awareness about the application.”
In fact, to create awareness about the app, its makers have been in talks with several companies, including BPOs, colleges and are also working towards collaborating with telecom operators and NGOs to promote their service. Mitra shared that the company is in talks with the Delhi government as well.
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