What is Digital India Initiative?
Along with Clean India mission, it has been long dream of Modi to serve India via e-governance. The
digital India initiative aims to connect rural regions and remote villages with high speed internet
services. This ambitious project, will save villagers to travel long distances to the concerned
department.
The Digital India programme is a transferred version of the already running National e-Governance
Plan. The project aims to provide thrust to nine pillars namely: broadband highways, universal
mobile connectivity, public internet access programme, e-governance, e-Kranti, information for all,
electronics manufacturing, IT for jobs and early harvest programmes. E-Kranti aims to give electronic
delivery of services. The project is expected to be completed by 2019.
Why Digital India?
Bridging the so-called digital divide in India is essential, as India embarks on a drive to rapid
modernization. In two years, 150,000 post offices will be transformed into multi-utility centres.
These centres will provide range of government services, e.g. banking. Around 250,000 government
schools will get broadband and free Wi-Fi and e-schoolbooks.
The digital push will bring immediate benefit to the government in terms of saving costs of public
services delivery. It is also integral to the governments plan to create 100 smart cities. Under this
plan, all cities with a population of more than a million will get public Wi-Fi hotspots. All government
communication will move to a universal secure email client.
Budget:
The Union Budget has approved the project, which has a total overlay of Rs 1 lakh crore.
It constitutes of multiple projects and the national broadband plan that comes under it will
cost the most with Rs 500 crore allocated to it.
The national information infrastructure will provide all necessary e-governance services at a
cost of Rs. 15,686 crore and will be ready by 2017
The plan will also ensure universal access to mobile phones to 42,311 villages in the country
that are still unconnected. The expected completion time is 2015 at a cost of Rs. 16,000
crore.
The plan also includes creating five new electronic manufacturing clusters in the next five
years.
It also includes creation of skill development centres to produce a workforce of 400,000 for
the electronics sector in the next five years at a cost of Rs 575 crore.
Monitoring:
The plan will be monitored and will ensure smooth implementation with the ministers of
finance, communications, rural development, human resources development and health
as members under Narendra Modis chairmanship.
The new posts of 'Chief Information Officers' (CIO) would be created.
Besides, a Digital India Advisory Group (DIAG) would also be created. It will supervise the
implementation of the programme and advise the government on policy issues for
accelerating the implementation of Digital India Programme.
Digital India Advisory Group:
o It will be formed and will be chaired by the Minister of Communications and IT.
o There will be an Apex Committee which will be chaired by the Cabinet Secretary
and the Expenditure Finance Committee (EFC) or Committee on Non Plan
Expenditure (CNE).
Advantages:
Digital India aims to bringing existing initiatives such as the Ebiz project, E-kranti, virtual
classroom, e-visas and the National Optical Fibre Network project under a single umbrella.
Government is also planning to enhance mobile connectivity in areas affected by left-wing
extremism.
When implemented, Digital India will connect 2.5 lakh villages by broadband and phones,
decrease import of telecom imports to zero and create 1.7 crore direct and 8.5 crore indirect
jobs.
Citizens will also be able to easily access government services in real time on mobile phones
and online, in Indian languages.
Department of Telecom is planning to make Wi-Fi hot spots in cities with population of over
10 lakh and in tourist centres under the Digital India program.
Silicon Valley Players:
US technology giants are eager to get involved in Digital India and Smart Cities projects.
U.S.-based global technology giant IBM expressed keen interest to participate in the
initiative.
After Jeff Bezos of Amazon and Satya Nadella of Microsoft, Mark Zuckerberg is the third
CEO of an internationally known corporation who has visited India.
The queue of American technology giants seeking to collaborate in the Digital India drive
reflects the growing confidence in investor sentiment in India.
Amazon, Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) and eBay have also shown
interest to expand their operations in the e-commerce space and participate in the
governments Digital India programme.
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