Anaxee gets $1M for project Swaraksha to solve vaccine hesitancy in rural India

Indore-based tech-enabled ID verification and data collection agency, Anaxee Digital Runners has received US$1 million for Project Swaraksha which aims to solve vaccine hesitancy in Rural India.

It is in charge of Project Swaraksha, India's largest door-to-door rural vaccine awareness campaign. The Indore-based company is using its pan-India coverage to not only address vaccine hesitancy in remote areas but also to ensure that approximately 10 lakh people volunteer to receive their first vaccine dose. This project will also employ 50000 Digital Runners and will aim to reach one million rural citizens.

To reach 23,000 remote villages and tribal hinterlands, the entire management, resource allocation, onboarding, and data collection are being handled digitally via the Anaxee app.

Meanwhile, the company is trying to dispel all misconceptions about vaccines in the country's outskirts as well as addressing vaccine hesitancy that has arisen as a result of myths/misinformation about Covid vaccination.

Vaccine hesitancy is a global phenomenon rather than a geographical phenomenon. Anaxee believes that structured counseling is the only way to address it. The villagers are being counseled one on one, and Runners are ensuring that vaccinations are successful.

Runners, can connect with people, answer their questions, and guide them through the entire process, from scheduling appointments to receiving vaccination certificates.

They also provide digital assistance to rural citizens, such as assisting them with the CoWIN portal, downloading vaccination certificates, scheduling appointments, and so on.

“Once we started Swaraksha, it was just a matter of time we found the perfect partners in Sandeep Nailwal and Punit Agarwal from the Crypto Relief Community. The Crypto Relief is focused on deploying funds of USD 400+ million on Covid relief works in India through various implementation agencies. In phase-1 of Project Swaraksha, United Way of Bengaluru (UWBe) committed USD 1 million targeting 10 lakh rural citizens using funds from its donor Crypto Relief (IN COVID SUPPORT FZE LLC). Apart from Anaxee, a lot of other NGOs connected with Crypto Relief are also providing their volunteers in Project Swaraksha. Few State/Districts government have shown interest in getting into MOU with Anaxee to implement the project in their geography."

“Deploying our resources was never an issue albeit covid since the majority of our operational management happens via our app. I think being technologically sound and data-driven from the start proved really helpful in materializing a task of this monumental scale. Still, I feel the battle is yet to be won and would certainly require similar yet extraordinary partnerships alongside private business houses, PSUs, NGOs, State governments, international organizations, health bodies, and other institutions. India offers as big a pie that anyone can ever fathom,” said Govind Agrawal, Co-Founder, and CEO of Anaxee Digital Runners Pvt. Ltd.

Project Swaraksha has already reached 85000 villagers across 22 states, 185 districts, and 1250 Tehsils in less than 40 days, with over 3000 runners registered. The figures are available to anyone via Project Swaraksha's live dashboard.

Anaxee recently signed an MOU with the Nagaland government's Mon District. Mr. Thavaseelan K, IAS, Deputy Commissioner, Mon, played a key role in bringing Project Swaraksha to the Mon district.

Anaxee Digital Runners is a technology-based platform that assists businesses and corporations in scaling in Tier-2, 3, and 4 towns and villages through its vast network of Digital Runners. The Digital Runner is a local tech-savvy individual who is connected to the Anaxee platform and ready to carry out a physical task. Govind Agrawal and Arti Agrawal of Indore, India founded Anaxee Digital Runners in 2016.

The company operates in 26 states, 540 districts, 11000 zip codes, and has a network of over 20,000 runners. They have served 1000+ (Direct & Indirect) Clients by providing on-demand services such as merchant acquisition, lead generation, customer digital onboarding, large surveys, data collection, physical verification, and KYC.

Anaxee has two offerings as part of Covid Relief activities: (1) Project Swaraksha – India's largest tech-enabled Vaccine Awareness Program; and (2) OC Tracker: It is a QR code + Backoffice (OCTracker.in) based integrated solution to track Oxygen Concentrators, BiPAP machines, and Cylinders imported and donated across India.

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