The education ministry report released by the Union Ministry of Education; Government of India revealed shocking facts about the digital divide in India.
The recent survey report by the Union Ministry of Education shows that the digital divide has hit some states disproportionately hard due to the pandemic situations. Due to the lack of adequate availability of smartphones and television sets there has been a severe digital divide between the schools and school going students.
The reports show that nearly 70% of the school-going children in seven large states – Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand do not have access to digital devices. This has created a huge gap between the schools and the children that further worsened in the Covid 19 pandemic situation.
Some of the findings based on the reports of the seven states facing digital divide are
Assam:
-
The state reported nearly 3,10,6255 students with no digital devices among the 7,01,5898 students across 65,907 schools.
-
To address this issue the state education department organised home visits by teachers, and launched a toll-free helpline for students to clear academic doubts and address psycho-social issues.
Andhra Pradesh:
-
Nearly about 2,01,568 students have no cell phone access and parents of 10.22 lakh have phones that can only make calls
-
Neary about 4.57 lakh students have access to phones but they do not have access to mobile data
-
Nearly about 3.88 lakh students don’t have access to Television and other media appliances
-
In an attempt to address this issue the state has distributed 2,850 laptops and 18,270 tablets as at present only 5,752 students in the state have laptops
Bihar:
-
Nearly 1.43 crore children have no access to digital devices.
-
To address this issue with the assistance of UNICEF, the state provided mobile vans equipped with TV, videos and other multimedia equipments
-
Further the activities like math games and toys were distributed across seven districts, with special focus on Mahadalit/Mushahar communities.
Gujarat:
-
The UNICEF survey of 12,000 schools found that 40% of the students did not have access to smartphones and Internet.