The origin of the Aarogya Setu application that was deemed 'essential' by the government in its fight against the dreaded coronavirus and has even found its mention in almost every Covid-19 related guidelines is unknown.
This was reported by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology in response to an RTI (Right to Information) application which questioned the Covid-19 contact tracing.
The NIC was pulled up by the Chief Information Commission and it issued a show-cause notice to the various chief public information officers asking them to provide a reply to the RTI application. The CIC said that the reply cannot be evasive.
The RTI was filed by one Saurav Das who claimed to have approached the NIC, National E-Governance Division (NeGD), and the ministry of electronics and information technology seeking to know about the creation of the Arogya Setu app.
The National Informatics Centre feigned ignorance stating that it has no information about who has created the Aarogya Setu app and how it has been created.
The application however credits both the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and the Ministry of Electronic and Information Technology for its creation.
Asking to explain why its name was mentioned on the website, the Information Commissioner Vanaja N Sarna ordered, "The Commission directs the CPIO, NIC to explain this matter in writing as to how the website https://aarogyasetu.gov.in/ was created with the domain name gov.in, if they do not have any information about it.”
Earlier, many questions were also raised about the working of the Arogya Setu app and on its feasibility in tracking the spread of the virus.