MyGov, NASSCOM CoE DSAI Announce Winners of Citizen Voice Challenge

MyGov in collaboration with NASSCOM CoE DSAI has announced the winners of “Citizen Voice Challenge”. Broadening its resolve to jumpstart and catalyze AI innovation in government, MyGov in association with CoE - DSAI (NASSCOM) had launched the “Citizen Voice Challenge” earlier this year, on September 14th. The initiative explored application of “Artificial Intelligence” towards automation leading to better governance and ensure effective and timely response in resolution of citizen issues. The 3 Grand Winners of the challenge, Mihup Communications Private Limited, Aiaioo Labs, Reverie Language Technologies Pvt. Ltd. were recognized for their efforts, frugal innovation and valuable contribution.

MyGov, the citizen-centric platform which empowers citizens to connect with the Government, has an operational voice helpline, which allows users to call and leave feedback and suggestions. It has more than 7.1 Million users who contribute their ideas through discussions, generating millions of interactions of which a significant percentage are voice based. These interactions are critical to unearth ground-level citizen issues, sentiments, enhance inclusive and participative governance and key policy initiatives.

Citizen Voice Challenge harnesses the power of AI to bring out automated solution(s) for the next emerging billions through a voice-first medium, foster their participation in governance and holistically consume and implement their feedback. The challenge provided opportunities to individuals and companies registered in India with expertise in Natural Language Processing (NPL) and Voice to Text Conversion to apply and demonstrate their capability to help MyGov automate their helpline.

Commenting on the challenge, Mr. Arvind Gupta, CEO, MyGov, said, “The government’s Digital India mission is centered around inclusive development and ensuring that the fruits of digital empowerment reach every household of India. One of the ways of doing this is by encouraging the participation of Indic language speakers and enabling their interaction with the government using voice.”

The three months long immersive challenge saw over 40 applications and after a rigorous three different stages of screening and selection process, 6 participants across India were shortlisted.

Expressing his thoughts on the initiative, Mr. Mohana Krishnan, Head, CoE-DSAI, NASSCOM, said, “Catalyzing innovation and excellence in data science and artificial intelligence in the country to improve and position India’s capabilities is a fundamental aspiration of the CoE DSAI. Such an initiative falls directly in line with our initiatives and we hope we can co-create a robust platform for the betterment and ease of development of the society. A challenge this extensive will lead to a nationwide impact on all citizens irrespective of language and they can be in complete control of reaching the highest levels of the Government to ensure they are heard, leading to a true democracy."

Providing the impetus for the development of innovative technologies across industries, NASSCOM CoE DSAI was established on a Public-Private Partnership with Government of Karnataka and Industry with a vision to build India's ecosystem in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence and establish India among the top 3 global DSAI destination by 2022.

In recent times, artificial intelligence has emerged from the confines of scientific labs and found various uses to impact everyday life. The expertise of Natural Language Processing can be utilized to bring out solutions in sectors such as Banking, Insurance, Financial Services, Automotive industries, Service industries like Airports, Malls, and much more including Government bodies.

It is expected that the data science and artificial intelligence industry in India (IT and non-IT industries) will be worth US $16 billion by 2025, and is likely to spur an additional employment of 150,000 professionals in the country.

NASSCOM, through its partner ecosystem will work towards accelerating innovation, enabling industry-oriented research, promoting adoption of data-driven decision making by enterprises and enabling appropriate skills and talent development. The Centre of Excellence will continue to provide high-end technology capabilities, data, expertise, thought leadership, and curated programs to augment capabilities across academia, enterprises, government, and innovators / advanced start-ups.