Guwahati: The availability of smartphones at home for school children has doubled to 71% during Covid’s pandemic in Assam and for two northeastern countries Manipur and Nagaland reached 92% this year.
But their access to smartphones for study purposes remains a concern.
For more than half of school children, smartphones are sometimes available or cannot be accessed at all.
This was revealed in the annual status of the 2021 education report (Aser) published on Wednesday, covering 581 districts in 25 states and three union areas in the country.
Safe! You have managed to provide your votelogin to see the results of five northeastern countries, where surveys are carried out, smartphones are available at 36.1% houses from Assam children surveyed in 2018.
The appropriate number in Manipur rose to 92, 9% by 2021 from 53.4% in 2018.
In Nagaland also smartphones were available with 92.9% of children at home in 2021, despite the same thing 50% in 2018.
For Meghalaya, the appropriate number was 41 , 9% (2018) and 77.9% (2021) respectively.
In Assam, 51.4% of the children surveyed received access to smartphones for study purposes sometimes, while for 22.9% it was inaccessible even though it was available at home.
In Manipur, 39.9% only have sometimes access and for 24.5% it is inaccessible.
The appropriate numbers for Meghalaya were 34.2% and 30.7% respectively.
Interestingly, in Nagaland, 41% sometimes get access to a smartphone, although only only 3.8% is inaccessible.
In Arunachal Pradesh, 84.6% of the registered school children have a smartphone at home in 2021.
But 50.7% of them have access to study purposes sometimes, while it cannot be accessed by 19.9%.
In Arunachal, which has a poor cellular network coverage in the extensive hill and mountain field, only 57.3% of children have smartphones at home in 2018.
Study research managers for Assam, Trishna Lekharu, told TOI that demand for smartphones increased during Covid throughout India.
“Even though the number of houses with smartphones is increasing, their level of availability for low-child studies.
The good news is that the availability of smartphones can help the government in providing smart education through digital media,” he said.
Aser 2021 is a household rustic survey conducted by telephone.
At the entire level of India, 67.6% of children were found to have a smartphone at home.
Smartphone at home but not for studies in Rural Assam: survey
