In India there is an app for everything. Even dream babies.

Do you want to raise a child with the business acumen of industrial magnate Ratan Tata, the concentration skills of spiritual guru Swami Vivekananda, the scientific brilliance of nuclear hero APJ Abdul Kalam and – of course – the patriotic confidence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi?

There is an app for that in India. In fact, many apps.

For centuries, Indian mothers have drawn on rich cultural and religious traditions to pass on a wealth of knowledge to guide children’s upbringing. Underlying this maternal legacy is a practice known as garbh sanskar, where nurturing a child and creating an environment conducive to instilling a Hindu value system begins in the womb.

But in today’s India, the old ways alone are no longer enough. A new kind of company is taking off, largely from the enterprising western state of Gujarat, targeting expectant mothers in a country hurtling headlong into a digital future.

Startups large and small offer apps that combine traditional prenatal and postnatal guidance with scientific research, weaving together wellness practices and nutrition plans, as well as daily development activities such as yoga, meditation, art, story reading and lullabies.

It’s all wrapped up in a slick interface for a generation that responds more readily to reminders from smartphones than those from mothers-in-law.

“Dear mother, if you can drink some water, please,” one of the apps, Garbh Sanskar Guru, pushes by text, taking on the personality of the fetus. “I like dancing in the rain.”

India prides itself on striking a balance between the old and the new. The rise of Mr. Modi, and a new elite around him, has promoted the idea that India can simultaneously pursue an inward-looking nationalism and expand its connections abroad. The app developers are counting on the fact that navigating this reality will require new tools and knowledge.

In doing so, the smartphone – accused of luring young Indians away from traditions and facilitating the spread of the worst forms of hatred and division – is being used to preserve the best values. Devices linked to increasing loneliness are programmed not only to help women cope with a period of intense anxiety and stress, but also to improve the bond between couples by bringing some structure to the pregnancy whirlwind.

When Dhara Jignesh Pambhar, 29, and her husband, Jignesh, were expecting their second child last year, both the parents and the older child, Darshan, who is now six, did activities together every day on one of the apps: reading a story, sing lullabies. Sometimes they placed their hands on Mrs. Pambhar’s belly and said to the fetus, “We welcome you to this world.”

What kind of baby did they want? The app recommended an exercise called the “dream map,” in which parents create a large collage to visualize the qualities they desire.

For the new child, Dhyey, a boy who is now 17 months old, the card included images of babies with good hair and sparkling smiles, as well as images of the Hindu gods Krishna, who represented friendship, and Hanuman, who represented power.

There was also a photo of the smiling and suited Mr Tata, the Mumbai industrialist who grew a Parsi family business into one of India’s largest international companies. Another photo, of an uncle, was “for height,” said Ms. Pambhar, who helps run an online business selling kitchen appliances. “Both my husband and I have some height problems.”

Sometimes, when the boys are restless or stubborn, the other women in the family taunt her, “But you used the garbh sanskar apps. Why?”

“It’s not like they’re always going to be perfect,” she answers.

Jitendra Timbadia, founder of one of the apps, called DreamChild, worked at a children’s activity center affiliated with a sect of Hinduism before turning to development research. The other founder, Chheta Dhaval, has a background in branding, and Mr Timbadia’s wife, Suyogi, a yoga instructor, designs and runs the app’s physical activities.

Given DreamChild’s far-reaching ambitions, Mr Timbadia said, modern research is crucial.

“From the sixth month of pregnancy to the fourth year, the blueprint of the entire life is laid down,” he said. “Today’s mothers won’t accept it without science.”

The app has had around 15,000 paying users since its launch in 2019. The basic package, with limited online activities, costs about $25 for nine months. Hybrid packages, which supplement the daily app routine with offline workshops, range between $100 and $180.

One afternoon, at the app’s offline center in Surat, a city in Gujarat, about 20 women—some well into their pregnancies, others in the planning stages—underwent yoga and breathing exercises while soft music played, before turning to art activities. turned.

Hetal Pandav, a 26-year-old optometrist, was in the first trimester of her first pregnancy. She said she came mainly for the sense of community.

“In families, even in highly educated families, people don’t talk about these things openly,” Ms. Pandav said.

“There’s no tension here, no worries, no family, nothing – us and our babies,” she added, running her hand over her stomach.

DreamChild regularly holds large seminars with the sales pitch ‘Make your pregnancy happy and confident’. In September, about 500 couples packed a large venue in Ahmedabad for a three-hour program that had the atmosphere of a job fair. They put sticky notes on a map of India and explained the qualities they wanted in their babies: self-confidence, creativity, empathy, national pride, honesty.

There was a performance from the Mahabharata, a Hindu epic in which Abhimanyu, the son of the central figure Arjun, absorbs battlefield strategies while still in the womb, while his father talks to his mother. Speakers at the event made more contemporary references: Mr Modi’s mother, Heeraben, recited the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, another epic, when she was pregnant with the future prime minister.

Recently, Prashant Agarwal, founder of the app Garbh Sanskar Guru, which has around 18,000 paying subscribers, himself conducted an online seminar, sitting in front of his laptop with a ring light nearby. About 125 people listened to his introduction, in which he discouraged reliance on unverified information passed through WhatsApp groups – “there’s nothing but confusion there.”

He guided the participants through the app and then showed them that sweet memory of drinking water: the baby, in the womb, wanting to dance in the rain.

“It’s not that any of us love babies any less. We forget,” he said. “How many of you can say no to your baby?”

He then announced the price of the package. The app startups recognize that moving people from free to paid offerings remains a challenge despite the rapid expansion of digital literacy and online payments in India. The problem is the structure of Indian families: husbands control the wallet.

Mr Agarwal offered a discount to anyone who registered within 30 minutes of the end of the session. A woman named Payal asked if the discount could be extended into the evening.

“Because, sir, I need to discuss it with my husband,” she said.

Ms Pambhar, the mother with height problems, used an app during both her pregnancies. She said that with her second child, she was able to see about “60 to 70 percent” of what she visualized in the dream card.

“For nine months I thought, ‘You’re going to do something big,’ like Abdul Kalam did,” she said, referring to the national hero who helped advance the country’s nuclear program and later became president of India.

She added with a smile: “But there is no pressure.”