Sandes: India’s WhatsApp Alternative, Key Features & Details

Sandes is an instant messaging platform that is launched by National Information Center.

Sandes is an instant messaging platform.

(Photo:GIMS)

As the Indian government is urging people to use ‘Made-in India’ social media platforms, a new instant messaging platform has been launched by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) called Sandes amid Twitter ban trends in the country.

This move has come after social micro blogging platform Twitter refused to comply with the orders of Indian government of blocking ‘anti national’ accounts.

Indian government is on a spree to promote made in India applications, and among them is the Koo app, which is now being promoted by several ministers including Union Minister Piyush Goyal.

A new report suggests that Sandes will be rolled out in full go, later in 2021. Here’s everything you need to know about India’s messaging platform.

What is Sandes?

Sandes is an instant messaging platform which is currently only available to government employees. This platform will be later accessible to all the users, several media reports suggest.

According to a report published by Business Standard, several government officials have already been using Government Instant Messaging Systems(GIMS) .This application has now been renamed to Sandes ,and is available on official GIMS website.

Currently the app is 30 MB in size and is available in both android and iOS devices. The platform is expected to be a WhatsApp alternative and supports voice and data messages exactly like WhatsApp.

What are Some Key features of Sandes?

While the user Interface of the app is quite similar to other apps,the app is under development stage and thus lacks some features. However,some key features of the app are:

• You can register on the app via email or phone number.
• Sandes offers its users ability to create groups with 200 member capacity.
• You can also share emojis, and forward text messages on the platform.
• The app is expected to roll out ‘Confidential’ feature which can be used to mark any message as confidential to ensure that the message is not forwarded to other users.
• You can also backup chat history to any email address.
• Sandes also offers its users to share a file to Digilocker directly. Any PDF document received in Sandes can be uploaded to Digilocker.
• You can share jpeg, png, mp3, mp4, pdf, doc, ppt, and excel files.
• Users also have the option to audio and video call each other.
• The Chatbot service in Sandes can be used to access dashboards of various initiatives by Government.

Sandes: Privacy Policy

While the backend of the Sandes app is controlled by NIC, there has been no formal privacy policy announced yet.