Incubated at IIIT Allahabad · StartinUP · DPIIT

India's First
Emotional Climate
Intelligence Platform

TARU helps institutions understand the emotional well-being of their people — anonymously, ethically, and in real time. No login. No identity. Just honest data that creates safer campuses.

Zero PII Stored
NEP 2020 Aligned
DPIIT Registered
221 Students Surveyed
🔒 Anonymous Session
How are you feeling today?
😞
😟
😐
🙂
😊
Optional: add a note — stays completely anonymous
🔒 No name · No login · No trace · Ever
Emotional Climate Index
3.4
Hopeful
68%
Stressed
43%
Distressed
18%
50.2%
students would use TARU
vs 22% use institutional counselling
56% students face moderate-severe distress · AIIMS-NCMH 2023
33% avoided help due to fear · CogniEase BRM 2026
84% want an institutional mood climate report
200M+ Indians affected by mental health disorders
3.1Cr students in UP with minimal MH infrastructure
χ²=15.89 p=0.044 — fear of judgment predicts TARU adoption
β=0.204 academic pressure predicts tool adoption intent
56% students face moderate-severe distress · AIIMS-NCMH 2023
33% avoided help due to fear · CogniEase BRM 2026
84% want an institutional mood climate report
200M+ Indians affected by mental health disorders
3.1Cr students in UP with minimal MH infrastructure
χ²=15.89 p=0.044 — fear of judgment predicts TARU adoption
β=0.204 academic pressure predicts tool adoption intent
✦ Real Stories · Real Problem

The silence that no one is measuring.

These are not statistics. These are people sitting in classrooms across India right now, carrying something no one can see.

📚
"She submitted every assignment."
She sat in every class. Smiled in every group photo. Submitted every assignment on time. Nobody knew she had been struggling for eight months. There was no system that could see what she was carrying. The institution had a counsellor — but she never went. She was afraid someone would find out.
📊 33% of students in our survey avoided help due to fear of being identified — CogniEase BRM 2026
🏫
"The principal wanted to help."
The principal of a private college in UP had been noticing something — fewer smiles in corridors, more absenteeism. He wanted to do something. But he had no data. No way to know which department was struggling or how many students were at risk. He was flying blind. TARU is built for him too.
📊 70% of institutions report being only partially aware or completely unaware of campus emotional climate
🗣️
"Anonymity is the main thing tbh."
A student from our survey wrote: "Anonymity is the main thing tbh, if it doesn't feel 100% safe, people just won't be real. Also don't make it feel like another useless form — at least give something helpful back. Keep it quick, no one's doing extra effort." This became TARU's product brief.
📊 55.7% of students said guaranteed anonymity is the #1 feature they need — 123 of 221 respondents
"Implement this tool immediately ASAP."
Another student wrote just five words. No explanation. No context. Just five words that carried the weight of everything our data showed — the dissatisfaction, the fear, the absence of anything that actually helped. Those five words are pinned above our workspace. They remind us every day why we're building this.
📊 30.8% of students actively dissatisfied with existing mental health support at their institution
✦ Primary Research · 221 Students · India · 2026

The numbers that built TARU.

We didn't build TARU and then look for a problem. We surveyed 221 verified students, ran chi-square tests and regression analyses, and let the data design the product. Every feature traces back to a number below.

56%
students report moderate to severe psychological distress
AIIMS-NCMH, 2023
50.2%
positive adoption intent for TARU — more than double institutional counselling utilisation rate
CogniEase BRM Survey, 2026
84%
find an institutional emotional climate report useful — direct B2B model validation
CogniEase BRM Survey, 2026
p=0.044
Chi-square confirms fear of judgment significantly predicts TARU adoption intent (χ²=15.89)
CogniEase Statistical Analysis, 2026
🔒
Anonymity is the Product
55.7% demand guaranteed anonymity. 54.8% don't trust existing tools. TARU's zero-knowledge architecture is not a feature — it is the entire proposition.
123 / 221
📈
Pressure Predicts Adoption
Regression (β=0.204, p=0.003) confirms academic pressure predicts adoption intent. As campus stress grows, TARU's market grows. Counter-cyclically demand-proof.
β = 0.204
🇮🇳
Hindi is Non-Negotiable
42.5% demand Hindi or regional language support. For tier-2 and tier-3 institutions across UP, multilingual NLP is a design requirement — not an enhancement.
94 / 221
Download Full BRM Research Report ↗
TARU
तरु · Tree · Growth · Shelter · Life
✦ Our Product

TARU is not a therapy app. It is not a crisis hotline. It is the early warning system that should have existed all along.

Students check in anonymously in under 90 seconds. The NLP engine processes sentiment. The Emotional Climate Index is generated. The institution sees patterns — never people.

Zero login. Zero identity. Zero compromise on privacy.

Request a Demo → See the Research
😶
Anonymous Check-In
1–5 mood scale plus optional text. No login. No data. QR code or link access. Under 90 seconds. Designed to actually be used by real students.
🧠
NLP Sentiment Engine
DistilBERT trained on mental health language. Detects direct and indirect distress signals including Hinglish. Generates ECI score per submission.
📊
Institutional Dashboard
Mood heatmaps, department breakdowns, trend analysis, distress hotspot detection. Administrators see patterns — never individuals.
🔐
Zero PII Architecture
Anonymisation built into the core. No personal identifiable information stored, transmitted, or processable. DPDP Act 2023 compliant by design.
🚨
Intelligent Threshold Alerts
When institutional ECI drops below threshold for 3+ consecutive days, administrators are automatically notified. Proactive, not reactive.
🇮🇳
Hindi & Regional Language
Multilingual NLP for Hindi and vernacular languages. Validated by survey — 42.5% of students require it for meaningful participation.
✦ How It Works

From check-in to institutional insight.

01
📱
Student Checks In
Scans QR code or opens link. No login required. Selects mood, adds optional text. Done in under 90 seconds. No identity attached — ever.
02
🧠
AI Analyses
NLP engine processes text and numeric input. Detects direct and indirect distress. Generates individual ECI score — fully anonymised before storage.
03
📊
ECI Aggregated
Scores aggregate at department and institution level. Individual data is irretrievable by design. Only patterns exist — not people.
04
🏛️
Institution Acts
Administrator sees dashboard, receives threshold alerts, downloads monthly NEP 2020 compliance reports. Evidence-based governance begins.
✦ About CogniEase

Built from understanding,
not assumption.

CogniEase Techno Labs was founded in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh — and will remain here. Not because there was no other choice, but because we believe the ecosystem needs to be built here, not just extracted from here.

Our founder brings MSc Botany, UGC NET in Social Medicine and Community Health, and deep research experience at the intersection of public health, behavioural science, and AI. We conducted primary research with 221 students, ran statistical analyses, and let data design the product.

MIND.TECH.EASE.

Community before capital
Every design decision is made by asking what serves the user's dignity first.
India-specific, not imported
Our models and cultural understanding of stigma are built for Indian institutional realities.
Rooted in Prayagraj
Building proof that world-class products can emerge from anywhere in India — and stay there.
Incubated At
IIIT Allahabad Innovation Ecosystem
Indian Institute of Information Technology Allahabad — premier technical institution providing incubation, infrastructure access, and mentorship.
Registered Under
StartInUP — Government of Uttar Pradesh
Officially registered under UP Startup Policy 2020, Department of IT & Electronics, Government of Uttar Pradesh.
DPIIT Registration
CogniEase Techno Labs Pvt. Ltd.
DIPP232026
Incorporated September 2025 · Prayagraj, UP
✦ Get In Touch

Let's build safer institutions together.

Whether you're an institution interested in piloting TARU, a researcher who wants to collaborate, an investor who sees the opportunity, or someone who believes in what we're building — we want to hear from you.