This Nawanshahr village has its own Android app

Aakanksha N Bhardwaj

Nawanshahr, September 2

A non-descript and little-known village, Sahungra in Nawanshahr has taken a giant digital leap to make its presence felt. The village is just a click away if you want to know its history, total population, percentage of men and women, literacy rate, etc.

In a unique initiative of its kind, it has developed its own Android app, ‘Digital Sahungra’. Claiming the village is India’s first online gram panchayat, Sarpanch Rajbalwinder Singh, 28, says the aim is to make the village popular by putting it on the digital map. Besides giving information, the app also facilitates filing of online complaints. Villagers can upload pictures and videos of the problems they are facing in the village on the app for quick redress.

On the app, there is an option of stars of Sahungra where there is proper information about the soldiers who got martyred in the China war, and those who were part of the World War I.

Besides, village residents or anyone downloading the app will get to know about current affairs as every news, be it national or international, is uploaded on the app for the users with an aim to keep them updated all the time.

Rajbalwinder, a graduate and now pursuing LLB, was recently honoured by the Nawanshahr district administration on August 15. He was also invited to the Digital Transformation Awards, 2021, organised by Governance Now.

“When I became a sarpanch three and a half years ago, I wanted to do something different for my village. The app has the forms of all national and state schemes that can be downloaded. Also, there is an e-library where books have been uploaded so that anybody who has the app could read it,” the young Sarpanch said. He now intends to add new features to make it further useful.