Reaching out to rural women on critical issues of health and nutrition through mobile phones, a programme was started today under which four informative videos will be sent and they will be "paid to view it".
The digital education programme, which aims to educate 25 million women by 2018 through the free videos in 18 different languages, was launched by Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi in partnership with Indian Academy of Paediatrics, Unicef, HealthPhone and Vodafone.
The videos will be sent to only Vodafone subscribers free of cost and the users will also get an incentive of Rs 10 for downloading all four videos.
According to UNICEF, around 48 per cent of children below five years are chronically undernourished. The campaign will target rural people through videos to educate them on better nutrition practices and prevention of child malnutrition.
"The campaign is very innovative and its target group is village women. There are a certain number of women in almost all villages who use mobile phones. This is going to be absolutely free and not only that they will be paid to view it," the minister said.
Gandhi said that the ministry will talk to other companies as well to participate in the campaign so as to widen its reach.
"The special thing about these videos is that they also tell what will happen if you don't take proper nutrition or if one has malnutrition," she said.
