Journalism of Courage
Railway minister shares video of ‘digital shagun’, leaves netizens divided
The musicians who were playing at the festivities had their QR codes pasted on their instruments so that people not carrying cash could use that.
Showering money on musicians during festivities like weddings and religious processions is part of many Indian cultures. Now, with time, musicians have adapted well to technology and have pasted the QR codes on their instruments like dhols to accept patronage or tokens of appreciation from people who do not carry cash.
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On Saturday, union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, shared a video that showed a man dancing in what appears to be a wedding procession and paying the musician by scanning the QR code on his dhol. Vaishnaw is currently serving as the Minister of Railways and Minister of Electronics and Information Technology.
While sharing this 20-second undated video, Vaishnaw wrote, “शादी में डिजिटल शगुन👍Digital India का विस्तार। 👏👏”. This roughly translates to, “Digital Shagun in marriage 👍 Expansion of Digital India. 👏👏”.
His video has over 3.4 lakh views and 14,000 likes. Commenting on it, a Twitter user wrote, “Not everything should be digitalized. This is stupidly boring”. Another person said, “Peak of Digitalization 😭😂 UPI has changed the whole game.”
Despite the innovation of the move, many people found that the UPI transaction takes away the authenticity of the celebrations.
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Back in February, Raju Patel, a Bihar resident known as “India’s first digital beggar”, made news after he started using a placard with a QR code for his PhonePe account to ask for alms. Explaining his need to innovate, Patel told ANI, “Many times, people refused to give me alms saying that they did not have cash in smaller denominations. Many travellers said that in the era of e-wallets there is no need to carry cash anymore. Due to this, I opened a bank account and an e-wallet account.”
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