Telangana To Host ‘Political Hackathon’ For The First Time In India

Hyderabad: For the first time in India, Telangana is going to host a Political Hackathon. Right from the preparation of manifesto to finding solutions to local problems, Telangana Information Technology Association (TITA) in association with Voice of Digithon and Hackathon Group is going to conduct the hackathon. The Election Commission has provided certain suggestions and recommendations for the initiative on Wednesday. For this purpose TITA team had interaction with the Election Commission Joint CEO Amrapali. While the Pre-Hackathon will be conducted throughout the month of November, the grand finale will be conducted during the end of November. The first Pre Hackathon will be held at Phoenix IT Park in Hi-Tech City on 3rd November. Voice of Digithon, the monthly technology publication will lend its support to the initiative. In addition to the IT corridor, the hackathon will be held in all the constituencies of the State.

The political hackathon has been designed in such a way that both political leaders and citizen can pose issues that need solutions. For instance in the political arena - How can one improve the voting percentage in the elections and what can parties and their leaders do? How can be rigging addressed? The participants in the hackathon need to develop solutions for real-time elections challenges. The hackathon besides aiming to find solutions to broader State-level problems will also seek solutions to many regional/local problems.

Any citizen over the age of 15 years can take part in the hackathon. One needs to login to https://goo.gl/oJi2hZ and enter their details to register for the hackathon. Such a kind of hackathon is rare in the world with precedence seen only on the Texas State of the USA. This is the first kind of its effort in India ever. The hackathon with the participation of both citizen and political leaders will not only help improving the voting percentage but also finding solutions to real political problems. The outcomes of the hackathon can be published in the form of a book, which can be given away to Election Commission, and all political parties in the country. The publication/book will help in streamlining the electoral process further.

When Team TITA approached the Chief Election Commission’s Joint CEO Amrapali with the Political Hackathon proposal, she has presented her suggestions on the matter. She has recommended ways to improve the vote percentage of elderly/senior citizens and differently able citizents and requested to present these challenges as part of the political hackathon. She further suggested that the Election Commission’s portal be promoted and the electoral process be familiarized through the hackathon.

TITA Global President and Hackathon Founder Sundeep Kumar Makthala said on the occasion, with an aim to bring a major transformation in the electoral system, the Political Hackathon will prove as a useful tool. The hackathon will pave way for people to share real-time electoral or political challenges for which they seek solutions, while also enabling to bring in systematic implementation of measures to solve those issues. Citizens can bring to notice the key expectations of them across parameters that impact the society. They can also highlight the changes/improvements they expect from the electoral system.

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Makthala added that voting is a key component of the democratic system and the hackathon aims to enable the electoral system to become people-friendly. He assured that this Hackathon will include the recommendations in the conduct of the hackathon to not only make it successful but also yield constructive/healthy outcomes.

Hackathon Team members Ranapratap Bojjam, Neha Bandari, Avinash were present during the meet with Election Commission at Secretariat.