Keeping in mind what has been going on in the country over a few weeks, citizens were requested to download the Bengaluru City Police Suraksha App (which can be downloaded on both Android and Apple phones). The app, thus far, according to sources has been downloaded for 40,000 times! The app connects users to the police control room to get help instantly. Even though some have said the app works well, others have complained that the interface and registering on it is a boring process. Be that as it may, the fact that the government and citizens are raising awareness on women’s safety is encouraging.
You can also download the 112 emergency helpline app, introduced by the Government of India. In which one can send out a request for help by pressing a button to relay emergency messages. The Karnataka government launched 112 as an emergency number on mobile phones about a month ago.
To add more options for safety, My Safetipin app was even launcher earlier in 2013. Kalpana Viswanath, co-founder and CEO of Safetipin, says: “It has had several updates since 2013. There have been about 100,000 downloads of the app all over India so far.” There are five key features, she adds: “When you open the app, it will give you safety score wherever you are. This safety score is calculated based on two things — an audit is carried out based on eight parameters, such as street lights, the number of people there, transport, and more. You can also do a safety audit yourself. Each road, based on the pins of each audit is marked in red, yellow, or green, (where red is unsafe and green is safe). We also have the safest route feature, in which if you are going from point A to point B, it will give you the safety score of each route. We have a tracking feature, which is, in a place you don’t feel safe you can ask someone to track you. You can either do an audit or express how you feel with a smiley. We also have safetipin night app.”
