Over 400 million Indians use WhatsApp to stay connected to their loved ones, message businesses of their choice and access essential services. WhatsApp being a simple, reliable, private and secure messaging app, takes away the hesitancy towards tech for a ‘new-to-digital’ user and often serves as the primary digital gateway for millions of Indians, particularly in semi-urban and rural areas. The platform's extensive reach makes it a powerful tool to scale social impact and deliver solutions for education, healthcare, and skill development. Women, in particular, have leveraged WhatsApp to create livelihoods, raise awareness, access services, and support social causes for their communities.
In Kullu, Himachal Pradesh, there are close to 1,700 children with developmental disabilities. With the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent lockdown imposed by the government, these children could not attend their therapy sessions. With each passing week of no intervention and therapy, families found that the children were lapsing into their pre-therapy routine. To solve these challenges, Dr Shruti More, the founder of the Samphia Foundation launched a ‘Therapy on Wheels’ programme on 3 December 2020. This was India’s first mobile van therapy unit and enabled the foundation to provide a door-to-door therapy service. The ‘Therapy of Wheels’ program continues to be functional, even post-pandemic and aims to reach every last mile and help as many special-needs children as possible. The foundation continues to use the simple technology of WhatsApp and uses different WhatsApp groups to connect with people and volunteers.