The case for IVR-based citizen journalism in Pakistan.

Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right. Unfortunately, this right gets denied to the majority of people because they cannot read and write. This is because most modern means of communication rely on textual interfaces that are not inclusive to less educated and visually impaired people. However, simple and feature mobile phones are becoming widely available to such populations. In this paper, we present Mehfil , an IVR based citizen journalism platform that was deployed in Pakistan for 41 days. It received 789 calls from 535 users (2.4% of them blind) from all provinces of Pakistan. Mehfil provides a platform to its users to report their local area problems by recording their grievances on a range of social issues including unemployment, personal safety, health, education, corruption and rights of disabled (especially visually impaired). This paper reveals a demand for mobile phone-based citizen journalism and grievance reporting platforms among low-literate people in Pakistan.