Vodafone Foundation along with NASSCOM, announces winners for ‘Mobile for Good Awards 2016’

Vodafone Foundation along with principal partner NASSCOM Foundation today, announced the winners for the 6th edition of its flagship initiative ‘Mobile for Good Awards’ committed to mobilising social change by leveraging the power and potential of the mobile technology, the Mobile for Good Awards acknowledge and support ideas and concepts from NGO/NFPs that effectively and efficiently empower communities and change lives in their own unique way.

This year, 11 winning innovations were recognised across two categories – ‘Leading Change Maker – NPO’ and ‘Leading Change Maker – For Profit’. Innovative mobile driven solutions in four critical areas of Health, Education, Agriculture & Environment and Women Empowerment & Inclusive Development were selected from both the categories. A special award was also given to the best Government led innovative mobile solution.

The five winning NPOs, were also awarded INR 1.5 million each and will be mentored by the best in the industry to expand and upscale their capacity, improve project monitoring and enhance impact evaluation of their projects. All winning projects will also be featured in, first of its kind – ‘Social App Hub’ by Vodafone.

Reflecting on this year’s winning innovations, P Balaji, Director- Regulatory & External Affairs, Vodafone India, said, “Telecom transforms lives with connectivity. At Vodafone, we are committed to bringing internet, broadband and connectivity to citizens across the country and support the larger vision of Digital India. Ideas that are translating this vision into reality must be supported and scaled-up. The near ubiquitous reach of the mobile phone offers a unique opportunity to connect, engage, develop content and deliver solutions that drive positive social and economic change, even in regions and among communities otherwise difficult to reach. The ‘Mobile for Good’ awards programme is our endeavor to do so.  Over the last 6 years, we have acknowledged 36 innovations, that use mobile technology to address some of India’s critical social and developmental challenges both in rural and urban areas. We are excited with the opportunities ahead and will continue to reward and mentor new ideas, innovations and applications that empower communities and have the potential to transform society at large.”

Nasscom Foundation is Principal Partner for the   Vodafone Foundation Mobile for Good Awards The partnership in its second year, was able to garner great of amount of national awareness leading to a record – 306 nominations received to date, bettering last year numbers by approximately 25 percent.

Shrikant Sinha, CEO, NASSCOM Foundation, said, “NASSCOM Foundation, in its quest to create a truly inclusive India, has been at the forefront of promoting the use of technology for social good. In Vodafone Foundation, we found an apt partner to strengthen the ecosystem for social innovation through the mobile phones. This collaboration, for the Mobile for Good awards 2016, is an extension of the vision of the two organisations, to transform lives through affordable and easily accessible mobile-based solutions and drive inclusive growth.”

Out of the 306 applications received, the eligible applications were evaluated carefully at the first Screening Committee meet consisting of senior representatives from Vodafone Foundation, NASSCOM Foundation, Grant Thornton, NextGen and other experts in the field.

The 23 selected Finalists, with 15 applications from the NPO category (including government) and 8 applications from the For Profit category, were then asked to make presentations of their projects in front of a Grand Jury Panel, consisting of eminent members from leading organisations across India such as Bhagyashree Dengle  (Executive Director – Plan India), Patu Keshwani (Chairman & MD – Lemontree Hotels), Rajiv Makhni (Managing Editor – Technology, NDTV) Rahul Chandra (MD – Helion Ventures) and Tom Thomas (CEO – Praxis) who finally narrowed it down to 11 Winners listed below:

 

NPO Category winners
Foundation for Ecological Securities	Composite Landscape Assessment & Restoration Tool (CLART)	Empowers the rural communities for better planning and decision making regarding soil and water conservation.
Centre for Health and Social Justice	Kishor Varta	Communicating meaningful messages through audio stories, contributing to knowledge creation and a shift in discourse around the issues of gender, sexuality and reproductive health.
Score Foundation	Project Eyeway	Making knowledge related to life with blindness available to people from all over the country through a helpdesk.
Amar Sewa Sangam	AMAR SEVA mVBRI PROJECT	Using technology to train parents to provide early intervention therapy in their own homes to children with disabilities.
Pratham Books	Missed call do, Kahaani Suno	Promote reading acquisition among children by providing millions of underserved children with easy access to good quality, affordable audio books in Indian languages to introduce the joy of learning through stories to them.
Government category winner
NOHP-NHM Tamilnadu	Oral Pre Cancer Screening Programme	The goal of oral cancer screening is to identify mouth cancer early, when there is a greater chance for a cure.
NPO – Special Mention
Sankalp Taru Foundation	Plant, Geotag and Track Trees using SankalpTaru G1 Mobile App	Empowering people by making tree plantation convenient through the use of the mobile.
For Profit category winners
I Exist Technology Solutions Pvt. Ltd.	Samwad- Two Way Interactive Platform	Delivery of financial awareness & social security awareness / services at affordable costs to sections of disadvantaged and low-income segments of society.
Callystro Infotech Pvt. Ltd.	CoBELS	CoBELS is a one of a kind learning solution that maps the scholastic and co scholastic skills prescribed by the curriculum into engaging games.
Quadio Labs Pvt. Ltd.	Qplus Hearing Aid App	Using digital signal processing technology to allow hearing impaired individuals to hear normally
Akshamaala Solutions Pvt Ltd	Unnati	Unnati” is a service targeted at farmers. This helps bring efficiencies to the overall agriculture value chain using Data science.
Krishna Kant Tiwari	Ausodhatmika	Providing right Information during Medical Emergency thereby bringing Transparency and Bridging the Information Gap Digitally.

 

Through these awards, structured mentorship and critical funding, both organisations hope to see an unparalleled transformation in the challenges afflicting the country today and are confident of making a transformative impact through the Mobile for Good program in the coming years.

For more information about the Awards, to apply and read about the past winners and their successful applications, please visit www.vodafone.in/mobileforgood