#GoodNews! Kannur Rolls Out Initiative to Combat Fake News
Through ‘Satyamev Jayate’, the Kannur district administration is training school kids to identify false information.
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In October 2017, the Kannur district administration issued a directive that parents who did not want to administer MR vaccine to their children should get a signature from the district collector.
To his horror, Collector Mir Muhammed Ali found many people queuing outside his office, asking for an exemption from the vaccination programme. At the time, Kannur, like many other districts in Kerala, was facing a low turnout for its MR vaccination drive, as the anti-vaccine lobby gained popularity. When he asked a parent why he objected to administering vaccine to his child, pat came the reply: “Vaccination is harmful, I saw it on WhatsApp.”
It was then that Collector Mir Muhammed realised the extent to which ordinary people blindly relied on WhatsApp forwards.
Months later, on 13 June, the district administration launched an initiative to combat false information and fake news. Called ‘Satyameva Jayate’, the initiative will see school children being trained to identify false information.
How Does it Work?
Training will be given to high school and higher secondary school students in the district, to identify false information and inculcate the need to question the authenticity of the messages they receive.
As a first step, 150 teachers from schools were identified and given one-day training. The initiative was inaugurated on 13 June, with the Collector giving training to the teachers, who will go back to their schools and train the students.
The anti-vaccination lobby that gained strength through social media is what prompted the Collector to come up with an initiative to encourage scientific temper in people.
The false information being propagated through social media during the Nipah outbreak recently cemented his belief that it was time the district administration steps in to solve the issue.
“There are many reasons why people tend to forward false information. According to research conducted by MIT, a lie gets circulated faster than a truth. And also, people want to be the first ones to pass on an information, which paves the way for incorrect messages to circulate,” Mir explains.
At the workshop, the teachers were trained in identifying false information and also in the means by which one can look for the source of any information they receive.
“We all live in a filter bubble, we choose our news sources. This means that we are exposed only to one kind of information, be it genuine or not. During the training, we urged the teachers to google and look for authentic sources, say news reports. This way, they can check the authenticity of the information,” the Collector said.
The Collector believes that it is important to train school students since most of them now have access to their parents’ mobile phones.
“It is important to tell children how to identify false news, since their parents may often be gullible and forward false information without verifying. We want children to tell their parents that everything they receive on WhatsApp may not be true.
When Whatsapp Messages Lead to Crime
In Tamil Nadu, there have been at least three recent instances where WhatsApp messages triggered violent crimes, in which mobs lynched people to death.
In Kannur too, there have been a few instances where such messages led to minor tensions, the Collector says.
“From a Kannur perspective, we wanted to make sure that crimes do not happen as a result of false information,” he adds.
Training will be given to the 150 schools shortlisted for the first phase in the next two months, after which the programme will be extended to cover more schools.
(Published in an arrangement with The News Minute)
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