Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/The Electric Rickshaws Initiative (ID: 22591978)
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Applicant Details
[edit]- Main Wikimedia username. (required)
Tulsi
- Organization
N/A
- If you are a group or organization leader, board member, president, executive director, or staff member at any Wikimedia group, affiliate, or Wikimedia Foundation, you are required to self-identify and present all roles. (required)
N/A
- Describe all relevant roles with the name of the group or organization and description of the role. (required)
Main Proposal
[edit]- 1. Please state the title of your proposal. This will also be the Meta-Wiki page title.
The Electric Rickshaws Initiative
- 2. and 3. Proposed start and end dates for the proposal.
2025-09-01 - 2025-11-30
- 4. Where will this proposal be implemented? (required)
Nepal
- 5. Are your activities part of a Wikimedia movement campaign, project, or event? If so, please select the relevant project or campaign. (required)
Other (please specify) Wiki Awareness Campaign in Nepal
- 6. What is the change you are trying to bring? What are the main challenges or problems you are trying to solve? Describe this change or challenges, as well as main approaches to achieve it. (required)
Through this proposal, we aim to raise public awareness and improve understanding of Wikipedia locally in Janakpur, Nepal and encourage people to use, edit, and support local-language Wikipedias, particularly Maithili Wikipedia by displaying Wikipedia-themed promotional materials on electric rickshaws in the city.
We chose electric rickshaws for Wikipedia promotion because they are one of the most visible, affordable, and eco-friendly means of transportation in Janakpur. Every day, these rickshaws carry thousands of passengers and travel through densely populated and high-traffic areas, making them an ideal platform for delivering public awareness messages. Unlike static billboards, electric rickshaws act as moving billboards, reaching both passengers and pedestrians across different parts of the city. This ensures continuous, wide-area visibility throughout the day. They connect deeply with local communities, operating in both urban and semi-urban routes where online outreach is still limited. The campaign leverages local language messaging in Maithili making the content culturally relevant and more understandable to the public. Being electric, these rickshaws support climate-friendly and sustainable outreach aligning with Wikimedia’s broader values of sustainability. Overall, the rickshaw campaign is a low-cost, high-impact solution to reach people who are not yet aware of Wikipedia’s presence in their language and it opens the door for broader community participation.
Our Objectives:
- To raise Wikipedia awareness in Janakpur through rickshaw promotions
- To collect at least 100 public responses through QR linked survey on Wikipedia knowledge
- To convert passive interest into active engagement by inviting interested people to orientation sessions
- To recruit new editors
- To develop the contents in Maithili Wikipedia
The Challenges we see:
- Low awareness: The majority of the population in the city knows about Wikipedia but is not aware of how it operates or that they can edit and contribute to it.
- Language barrier: Awareness of Wikipedia is largely for the English version; individuals are less aware that Wikipedia exists in their own languages (Maithili, Nepali, etc.).
- Limited online engagement: Large segments of the population still rely more on offline or physical promotion channels than on online ads or social media.
- Access and inclusivity: Internet literacy is growing, but there are still plenty of people who need to be encouraged and information made available in accessible, visible formats.
Our Approaches:
- Use electric rickshaws as mobile billboards to display attractive, easy-to-understand Wikipedia promotional messages in Maithili and Nepali.
- Target local languages to make the message actionable and relevant.
- Choosing electric rickshaws fosters environmental sustainability along with knowledge sharing.
- Getting people's attention offline (on the streets) and pointing them towards finding Wikipedia online.
- Taking the campaign activities in pictures and media coverage to inspire more awareness and replication.
This approach creates high visibility, cultural relevance, and community engagement, bridging the gap between Wikimedia projects and overall public knowledge in the city.
- 7. What are the planned activities? (required) Please provide a list of main activities. You can also add a link to the public page for your project where details about your project can be found. Alternatively, you can upload a timeline document. When the activities include partnerships, include details about your partners and planned partnerships.
Here is the planned timeline for the project activities and flow,
- Phase 1: Planning & Design (Week 1–2)
- Identify high visibility routes of the city
- Coordinate with rickshaw drivers & local associations
- Design and print banners along with survey QR code
- Phase 2: Campaign Launch (Week 3–6)
- Install banners on rickshaws
- Monitor daily operation
- Phase 3: Engagement Events (Week 5–8)
- Connect with interested people through survey and rickshaw drivers via call and messages
- Host 1–2 small Wikipedia orientation session
- Phase 4: Wrap-up, Documentation & Reporting (Week 9–12)
- 8. Describe your team. Please provide their roles, Wikimedia Usernames and other details. (required) Include more details of the team, including their roles, usernames, Wikimedia group, and whether they are salaried, volunteers, consultants/contractors, etc. Team members involved in the grant application need to be aware of their involvement in the project.
We have skilled core team members with designated roles to look after the campaign thoroughly. Below are the details:
- Tulsi Bhagat – Project Lead (Volunteer role)
- Biplab Anand – Adviser (Volunteer role)
- Bijay Chaurasia – Designer (Volunteer role)
- Pankaj Deo – Operations Manager (Volunteer role)
- Sanjog Dev (profile) – External Partnership Manager (Volunteer role)
- Nilam Karn – Communication (Volunteer role)
- TBD – Campaign Manager (Salaried role)
- 9. Who are the target participants and from which community? How will you engage participants before and during the activities? How will you follow up with participants after the activities? (required)
Our targeted participants are general public in the city where electric rickshaws are highly in use for transportation. Maithili-speaking communities, including students, young professionals, and local residents who may not yet be familiar with Wikipedia.
To be precise, our primary target is high school/college students (15–24 years), Young professionals (25–35 years) and secondary target includes rickshaw passengers of all ages, local business owners and local content creators.
We will be doing pre-campaign briefings with e-rickshaw drivers to explain the goal of the campaign and encourage active promotion. Moreover, there will be a couple of participants' orientation sessions in which we will be explaining the contexts of Maithili Wikipedia by using available resources and encourage to contribute to the project. As such we expect that Maithili Wikipedia will have a couple of new editors which we are lagging behind.
We will be following up with participants after the activities by following manner:
- Thank-you gifts or appreciation letters for participating e-rickshaw drivers and participants.
- Uploading campaign photos to Wikimedia Commons and share updates with the Wikimedia community.
- Post-campaign blog post on Wikimedia Diff highlighting the impact, success stories, and lessons learned.
- Tracking Maithili Wikipedia traffic for 1–3 months during the campaign to assess the readership growth.
- Inviting interested participants (through rickshaw drivers or social media or phone call) to future Wikipedia workshops or editing campaigns in the future.
- 10. Does your project involve work with children or youth? (required)
Yes
- 10.1. Please provide a link to your Youth Safety Policy. (required) If the proposal indicates direct contact with children or youth, you are required to outline compliance with international and local laws for working with children and youth, and provide a youth safety policy aligned with these laws. Read more here.
- 11. How did you discuss the idea of your project with your community members and/or any relevant groups? Please describe steps taken and provide links to any on-wiki community discussion(s) about the proposal. (required) You need to inform the community and/or group, discuss the project with them, and involve them in planning this proposal. You also need to align the activities with other projects happening in the planned area of implementation to ensure collaboration within the community.
We had discussed the idea earlier and with the unapproved proposed event and following recommendations from the WMF team, we are up for this small promotional campaign. We have discussed this on during the weekly call of Maithili Wikimedians on Google Meet and in our official telegram group.
- 12. Does your proposal aim to work to bridge any of the content knowledge gaps (Knowledge Inequity)? Select one option that most apply to your work. (required)
Language
- 13. Does your proposal include any of these areas or thematic focus? Select one option that most applies to your work. (required)
Education
- 14. Will your work focus on involving participants from any underrepresented communities? Select one option that most apply to your work. (required)
Digital Access
- 15. In what ways do you think your proposal most contributes to the Movement Strategy 2030 recommendations. Select one that most applies. (required)
Increase the Sustainability of Our Movement
Learning and metrics
[edit]- 17. What do you hope to learn from your work in this project or proposal? (required)
With this project, we hope to determine if offline, eco-friendly campaigns like electric rickshaw promotions can effectively get people in Nepal aware of Wikipedia and try to involved themselves to contribute. Specifically, we hope to determine:
- What level of public awareness exists about Wikipedia in their local language?
- What topics do people most want to read and/or write on Maithili Wikipedia?
- How effective are rickshaws in attracting offline attention compared to static posters?
- Can offline campaigns lead to sustained engagement or editing interest?
- 18. What are your Wikimedia project targets in numbers (metrics)? (required)
| Other Metrics | Target | Optional description |
|---|---|---|
| Number of participants | 75 | Orientation sessions participants |
| Number of editors | 10 | Established as well new editors |
| Number of organizers | 6 |
| Wikimedia project | Number of content created or improved |
|---|---|
| Wikipedia | 100 |
| Wikimedia Commons | |
| Wikidata | |
| Wiktionary | |
| Wikisource | |
| Wikimedia Incubator | |
| Translatewiki | |
| MediaWiki | |
| Wikiquote | |
| Wikivoyage | |
| Wikibooks | |
| Wikiversity | |
| Wikinews | |
| Wikispecies | |
| Wikifunctions or Abstract Wikipedia |
- Optional description for content contributions.
N/A
- 19. Do you have any other project targets in numbers (metrics)? (optional)
Yes
| Main Open Metrics | Description | Target |
|---|---|---|
| Increase Siteviews/Pageviews | Maithili Wikipedia | 100000 |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
| N/A | N/A | N/A |
- 20. What tools would you use to measure each metrics? Please refer to the guide for a list of tools. You can also write that you are not sure and need support. (required)
Financial proposal
[edit]- 21. Please upload your budget for this proposal or indicate the link to it. (required)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1KPqGEtcrYer6EWzLkjcGlSbqx9qzW2fShHajKG4qhys/edit?usp=sharing
- 22. and 22.1. What is the amount you are requesting for this proposal? Please provide the amount in your local currency. (required)
565000 NPR
- 22.2. Convert the amount requested into USD using the Oanda converter. This is done only to help you assess the USD equivalent of the requested amount. Your request should be between 500 - 5,000 USD.
4196 USD
- We/I have read the Application Privacy Statement, WMF Friendly Space Policy and Universal Code of Conduct.
Yes
Endorsements and Feedback
[edit]Please add endorsements and feedback to the grant discussion page only. Endorsements added here will be removed automatically.
Community members are invited to share meaningful feedback on the proposal and include reasons why they endorse the proposal. Consider the following:
- Stating why the proposal is important for the communities involved and why they think the strategies chosen will achieve the results that are expected.
- Highlighting any aspects they think are particularly well developed: for instance, the strategies and activities proposed, the levels of community engagement, outreach to underrepresented groups, addressing knowledge gaps, partnerships, the overall budget and learning and evaluation section of the proposal, etc.
- Highlighting if the proposal focuses on any interesting research, learning or innovation, etc. Also if it builds on learning from past proposals developed by the individual or organization, or other Wikimedia communities.
- Analyzing if the proposal is going to contribute in any way to important developments around specific Wikimedia projects or Movement Strategy.
- Analysing if the proposal is coherent in terms of the objectives, strategies, budget, and expected results (metrics).