AP govt to use geotagging to provide better, speedy services to people

Ongole: The state government has initiated the geotagging of households and connecting with the family members residing in the house. This initiative is said to be in line with the efforts of the government to provide transparent, speedy, and better services, including relief and rescue operations.

Geotagging is a process of assigning a ‘geo-tag’ or adding some ‘geographical information’ in various ‘media’ forms such as a digital photograph, video, or even an SMS message.

This information is usually in the form of latitude and longitude coordinates, but can also include other data like altitude, bearing, distance, accuracy, place names, and time stamps. Geotagging has proved to be highly beneficial in implementing housing schemes in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, and other states earlier.

Now the state government is using this technology to capture the photo of the house or portion and authenticate it with the biometrics or iris or E-KYC of the people residing in it. By geotagging the household, the government can link it to the other information of the household members. The department of village and ward secretariats gave the responsibility of geotagging the households to the secretariat employees who are already working on it.

A senior official in the department in Vijayawada said that this geotagging data will put the state ahead of all other states, in providing the best services, just like in the USA, Canada, or the UK. The officer explained that after the completion of geotagging, the government will have the data of all households in the state, particularly who is residing in which house, their phone numbers, Aadhaar numbers, and the data of services that their Aadhaar number is linked to.

He said that as the data is being shared with all departments, including the police, disaster response, and fire services departments, the caller in an emergency need not explain his address unless he is somewhere outside.

He said that the officer attending the call can alert the nearby office shown on the map and send help in no time. Also, he explained that the geotagging data can also be used to refine the welfare scheme beneficiaries and see the eligible won’t be left behind.

Ongole municipal commissioner K Venkateswara Rao said that the village/ward secretariat staff have already completed 22.2 per cent of the geotagging of the total 85,166 households in the corporation limits.

He said that they are recording the door number, photo and geolocation, the longitude and latitude, of the house, and uploading on the app provided for the purpose. He clarified that any person registered as part of the household can authenticate the data by validating biometrics, iris, or E-KYC.