82
beggars per 100,000 people in West Bengal — the highest density in India. Assam 75, Odisha 40, Tripura 37, Chhattisgarh 37.
Source: Census 2011 / SECC 2011
App 03 / Dignity, not cash
You want to help. The money goes to the gang.
Sevarthi puts a social coin in your phone — locked to food, clothes, dignity. Loaded at the intersection. Redeemed at partner stores. Matched by brands as CSR. You see what your gift bought.
The size of the gap
When the system cannot measure the problem, it cannot fix the problem.
Begging in India is recorded as an occupation in the Census. There is no aggregate annual figure for the size of the economy. That gap is the first thing Sevarthi changes.
$236B
annual global profits from forced labour and forced sexual exploitation. 27.6 million people in human trafficking on any given day. One in three are children.
Source: ILO Global Estimates of Modern Slavery 2024
Not measured
is the official aggregate size of India's begging economy. The Census records it as an 'occupation' alongside cultivation. The gap is itself a data point.
Source: Census 2011 / IPC paper
The mechanism
Closed-loop social coin. Open-loop policy data.
01 He carries a beacon, not a bowl.
Each registered person carries a small BLE beacon. The beacon links to a verified profile — name, last meal, last shelter visit, partner-store eligibility.
02 You buy a social coin, not a coin to a gang.
At the intersection, the giver loads a social coin to the beacon. The coin is locked to food, clothes, and dignity items at partner stores. A brand can match the coin as CSR.
03 The state finally has rotation data.
Anonymised rotation patterns become a government-grade dataset on poverty, urban welfare, and human-trafficking interception — a measurement instrument as much as a giving mechanism.
The double mandate
Sevarthi pays for itself as much as a measurement instrument as a giving mechanism.
For the giver
Your money cannot be intercepted by a handler. It buys a meal at the partner shop on the corner. You get a notification of what was purchased. Brands match the coin as CSR. The receipt is the gift.
For the state
For the first time, an anonymised dataset shows where beggars rotate across the city, who has earned enough today, and which corners are captured by visible/powerful actors versus the under-served. Policy without rotation data is policy in the dark.
“I want to give but the money goes to a gang. So Sevarthi was born. We needed an organisation to hold these together. SocioApps.”
Volunteer pool
Sign up early — three roles.
We are activating Sevarthi in three roles before public launch. Tell us which is yours.
The volunteer pool
One signup. The same network powers SecureMe and Chakshu.
Sevarthi givers double as SecureMe responders and Chakshu eyes. The right responder is always the closest one.
Read the volunteer brief