Govt school teachers vent ire over mobile attendance app

Hyderabad: The Government-run school teachers in city, Rangareddy and Medchal districts has opposed the decision of the Education Department of implementing Geo-Attendance by using a mobile app, for both teaching and non-teaching staff and questioned why the contract of handling the app is given to a private mobile agency?

Recently School education department in Telangana has issued an order for implementing Geo-Attendance by using a mobile app as a pilot project in government schools of the three districts of Telangana. The staff has to mark their attendance both in and out time through the mobile app by taking selfie photograph tagged with latitude and longitude of the school building along with time stamp and app will be operated by Vivo Professional Services Private Limited.

"We were not consulted on this app and were not informed about its features, just one week back headmaster of my school sent a link and ordered us to download it on our mobile phones and was only informed that very soon attendance by using a mobile app will be starting. These are our personal phones, and we don't know what other information it can access, or who has access to the data - what if it gets hacked, especially we women teachers will be at great risk," said Arshia Farhat, a government schoolteacher.

Ahmed Khan, another government school teacher, said, " Our privacy is at risk, as this app will be operated by Vivo Professional Services Private Limited that is a private company, as we teachers have to take selfie photos through the mobile application and that should match with the existing details on the app and this is not right, as State government cannot force us to mark the attendance by taking selfies. Already other methods of marking attendance are available, as daily we are manually marking our attendance in the register, then why there is a need for this app."

M Ravinder, general secretary, Telangana Progressive Teachers Federation (TPTF), said, Biometric attendance is acceptable but implementing Geo-Attendance by using a mobile app is not acceptable. Also, question is why the contract is given private agency.

It will be better under IT department, government of Telangana this app should be supervised. To strengthen the attendance of teaching staff first of all education department should intensify the supervising system by appointing and promoting officers that are pending for ages. Inspite of that, the education department has wasted money on appointing private agency.