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Artisan Pehchaan Card

Making the application easier to understand, one field at a time.

Designer
Kuldeep Singh
Focus
Usability & information hierarchy
Output
Redesigned paper application
Redesigned handicraft artisan application form printed on white paper against a textured black background.

Context

A small form. An important point of access.

The Pehchaan application registers handicraft artisans for formal recognition and access to government support. It collects personal, professional and financial information, often with help from NGOs or local facilitators.

Manual verification, unclear documentation requirements and limited digital access add friction. This project focuses on the paper form itself: making it clearer for applicants and the people helping them.

Usability audit

The applicant should not have to decode the form.

I reviewed the form field by field, looking at language, input formats, grouping and the space available to respond. Instructions left out familiar terms such as passport-size photograph. Dates, phone numbers and account details gave little guidance on how to answer, and abbreviations like “working unit” put interpretation on the applicant.

Questions about existing cards did not clearly separate yes, no and the follow-up needed. Family details had no clear table header, and dense, uneven formatting made everything look equally important.

The original form annotated with field-level issues, including inconsistent formatting, missing input formats, unexplained abbreviations and unclear family and employment fields.
Field-level audit of the original application.

Information structure

I found the structure before changing the layout.

Mapping the existing fields revealed seven groups of information. That separated personal answers, verifiable records and official declarations, and gave each a clearer place on the page. A consistent column and baseline grid then aligned labels, writing lines and character boxes, so spacing and hierarchy do the organising without adding more instructions.

The redesign

Clearer questions. More predictable answers.

Four changes do most of the work. Each one asks less of the person filling in the form.

The expected format, made clear

Before
Date of Birth:
After
Date of Birth
DDMMYYYY
Character boxes make dates and numeric details easier to enter consistently.

The form asks, then follows up

Before
Identity Card number of Handicrafts artisans, if any
After
Do you have an artisan identity card?
YesNo
A clear question comes first. The card number is requested only when the answer is yes.

A structure for repeated entries

Before
Member name / relation / ageMember name / relation / age
After
Member NameRelationAge
A shared table header gives each family member a predictable row.

Visible choices

Before
Status whether Shilp Guru / National Award / National Merit Certificate holder / State Award
After
Have you won any of the following awards?
Individual checkboxes replace award names embedded in a line of text.
Redesigned Artisan Pehchaan Card application: aligned fields, explicit date format, yes/no questions and a clear family table.Redesign
Original Artisan Pehchaan Card application: dense table, tightly packed fields and unclear instructions.Original

Where it stands

Less interpretation, more clarity.

The redesign brings familiar language, visible choices and a consistent writing structure to the same paper format. The focus is clarity at the point of entry: what is being asked, how to answer and what to do next.

This study documents the audit and design decisions. Testing with artisans and facilitators would be needed to assess completion time, errors, and where people still need help.