WhatsApp chatbot MyGov Corona Helpdesk surpasses 30 million users

This chatbot is available in English and in Hindi and it can be accessed by messaging ‘Hi’ on the WhatsApp number +91 9013151515 followed by the query.

WhatsApp chatbot (Pixabay)

The Indian government back in March last year had launched a WhatsApp chatbot called MyGov Corona Helpdesk to provide information pertaining to Covid-19 to the citizens. Now, almost a year later, WhatsApp has announced that the chatbot has crossed the 30 million users milestone in India. This makes it one of the largest Covid-19 helplines on the messaging platform.

For those of you who don't know, MyGov Corona Helpdesk chatbot is powered by Haptik's conversational AI solutions. It is available in English and in Hindi and it can be accessed by messaging ‘Hi' on the WhatsApp number +91 9013151515 followed by the query.

The Facebook-owned messaging site says that the MyGov Corona Helpdesk chatbot has processed over 45 million conversations on WhatsApp from users across the country and that more than 67 million messages have been sent, since its launch.

Apart from this, WhatsApp has also enabled over 16 COVID helplines in 13 other Indian states in English and regional languages to provide credible information from authentic sources to the users.

“Since the pandemic first hit our country, one of WhatsApp's most significant associations has been with the Ministry of Health and with MyGov. With the power of easy to use technology citizens gained access to the latest, verified information on Coronavirus. This is a true testament of India embarking on a journey of building an ecosystem of credible COVID related information that people could trust and at a time when they needed it the most, and on a larger canvas, it is definitely also a defining step towards building and strengthening a digitally empowered India,” Shivnath Thukral, Director - Public Policy, WhatsApp said on the occasion.