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Introduction

The changing face of India has a rich cultural heritage, dating back many
India. Part I: bridging the centuries. Having missed out on the industrial
revolution, India is now slowly inching towards a
digital divide super-power status in an era of knowledge
revolution. Having been left behind by other
Khaiser Nikam countries, successive governments of post-
independence India have pushed forward in the
A.C. Ganesh and area of information, communication and
M. Tamizhchelvan technology (ICT).
With the world at one’s fingertips via ever-
growing numbers of satellite channels, the Internet
The authors
and World Wide Web, there is a huge explosion of
Khaiser Nikam is a Reader at the Department of Library and information. The concomitant exposure to the
Information Science, University of Mysore, Mysore, Karnataka, western world has led to a fear of cultural invasion.
India.
But if deployed appropriately, ICTs can effect
A.C. Ganesh is the Chief Web Writer, Express Network Private
Limited, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. economic, social and political empowerment.
M. Tamizhchelvan is Librarian, The New Indian Express, Success depends on the private sector, dynamic
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. non-governmental organisations (NGOs), the free
flow of information and, in particular, equal
Keywords information access for women.
Developing countries, India, Libraries Realising the pivotal role that ICT plays in
combating the rural and urban divide, be it in
Abstract education, administration or economic
development, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee
“India lives in villages” said the Father of the Nation, Mahatma
Gandhi. With 1,000 million people and 180 million households, said in a televised address to the nation on 22
India is one of the biggest growing economies in the world. With March 1998 “The Government will strive hard to
the advent of the Information, Communication and Technology make India a global Information Technology
(ICT) revolution, India and its villages are slowly but steadily power – specifically, [we will] make India one of
getting connected to the cities of the nation and the world the largest generators and exporters of software in
beyond. Owing to the late Rajiv Gandhi, India is now a powerful the world – within 10 years”. As an initiating step,
knowledge economy, and though India may have been slow to a high powered National Task Force on IT and
start, it certainly has caught up with the West and is ahead in
Software Development was set up by the Prime
important respects. The Government, the corporate sector, NGOs
Minister’s Office on 22 May 1998, under the
and educational institutions have supported rural development
by encouraging digital libraries, e-business, e-learning and e- Chairmanship of the Deputy Chairman of
governance. The aim of this paper is to touch upon and highlight Planning Commission. This task force has a
some of the areas where, by using ICT, the masses have been mandate to formulate the draft of a National
reached in this way. A follow-up paper will outline collections of Informatics Policy (National Task Force on IT and
significant cultural material which, once national IT strategies Software Development, 1998).
are fully achieved, could form part of a digitally preserved Thus, the government has tried to ensure the
national heritage collection. convergence of a variety of initiatives in this regard,
with the aim of addressing the digital divide among
Electronic access
rural and urban populations. The compiling of
The Emerald Research Register for this journal is local content, setting up information kiosks in
available at villages, e-governance for better administration
www.emeraldinsight.com/researchregister and educating the masses about the importance of
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is
available at Received: 24 April 2003
www.emeraldinsight.com/0024-2535.htm Reviewed: 22 July 2003
Revised: 12 January 2004
Accepted: 28 January 2004
This paper is a revised version of a paper presented at
“International Conference Culture: From
Information to Knowledge: The Role of Culture in
Library Review the Knowledge Based Society, Moscow, 7-9 April
Volume 53 · Number 4 · 2004 · pp. 213-219 2003”.
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited · ISSN 0024-2535 All Web sites in the text of this paper were accessed
DOI 10.1108/00242530410531839 and found correct as of 24 January 2004.
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ICT have all played a part in these efforts. In short, capital to increase the ability to absorb and use
this is a strategy for fostering sustainable knowledge and investing in technologies to
development through creating information rich facilitate both the acquisition and the absorption of
societies, supporting livelihoods and bridging the knowledge. . .” represents the best possible strategy
urban/rural divide. UNCHS (Habitat) for the overall development of any region or people
(www.unhabitat.org) says that the objective of “because knowledge generation and information
promoting the use of ICT by local government is processing are at the roots of new productivity”
to encourage them to follow and adapt to recent (Vijaya Raghavan and Nair, 2001).
progress in technology, adopting concepts of According to the 2001 census, India has a
e-governance to pursue “a system of government population of over 1 billion, with an urban
and a culture of governance that is participatory, population of around 28 per cent and a rural
inclusive, based on the rule of law, responsive to population of 72 per cent. In March 2001, the
the need of the population, efficient, transparent number of village telephones was around 4
and accountable.” lakhs[1] and Internet users stood at some 30 lakhs.
According to a study report by TeNet Group, IIT
Madras (www.tenet.res.in), India has 180 million
households with 35 million telephone connections
Role of ICT in bridging the rural-urban and around 2 million Internet users, though with
divide very few in rural India. Bharat Sanchar Nigam
Limited (BSNL www.bsnl.co.in) has around
In the early years of ICT, libraries were hesitant to 25,000 rural exchanges with 70 per cent of them
use technologies like computers, modems, connected on fibre. Rural India covers
scanners, and the Internet – they were expensive, 2,761,300 km2; on average one fibre connects a
especially for the rural masses. But over the last rural exchange every 150 km2. With wireless
few years, with access to technology becoming systems slowly being installed, almost 80-85 per
cheaper and economically viable, one can see cent of Indian villages will be connected to the rest
improved information flows throughout the
of India and the world.
society. Government and other institutions have The Internet in India started off in the late
made use of these technologies. If properly
1980s, when the Education and Research Network
deployed, ICTs have enormous potential as tools
(ERNET www.ernet.in) was launched, with
to increase information flows and empower the
funding from the Department of Electronics
poor.
(DOE) of the Government of India, and the United
Although radio and television (with 92 and 80
Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The
per cent penetration, respectively among Indian
project involved a number of premier institutions:
population) play an important role in giving
the National Centre for Software Technology
information to people, they are not interactive and
(NCST), Mumbai; the Indian Institute of Science
often fall short of addressing certain information
(IISC), Bangalore; the five Indian Institute of
needs. Though its penetration is less than TV or
Technologys (IITs); and the DOE. The second
radio, the Internet is considered to be an effective
major networking initiative was the National
tool for reaching the remotest and most excluded
Informatics Centre (NIC, http://home.nic.in), with
rural poor, provided there is connectivity or other
a national network connecting most district
means to access information. Such information
headquarters in India. Currently, NIC
should be retrievable in user-friendly modes, in a
interconnects 1,400 points in different parts of the
language that the poor can understand.
country through their network, predominantly
based on VSAT[2]. The NIC is intended to supply
information for governmental programmes. Lately,
ICT in India: then and now NIC has been providing bandwidth for quasi-
governmental organisations as well.
Information is the raw material of knowledge. For the ordinary citizen of India, the Internet
Though information and knowledge are vital for arrived in India on 15 August 1995 when Videsh
economic growth and global power, it is only Sanchar Nigam Limited (VSNL) launched its
under the right technological, social and cultural gateway services. Initially, there were few takers for
parameters that they become directly productive the services, but the late 1990s saw a boom in the
forces. Knowledge and ideas are at the heart of the growth of users. The opening up of the telecom
development process and are increasingly sector in 1999 saw several new players entering the
overshadowing the natural resource base: field and since then, there has been an ever-
“acquiring and adapting global knowledge and growing competition among them, notably,
creating knowledge locally, investing in human VSNL, SIFY, TATAs, MTNL, to name a few.
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Role of government in rural knowledge limited voice in the institutions, policies and
management processes that shape their lives, requires effort by
government, NGOs, the private sector and other
Helping India take giant strides to become an partners. ICTs can play a significant role in
information superpower, at the CII Annual supporting livelihoods through information on the
Session on 28 April 1998, Prime Minister Atal better use of natural resources, markets,
Bihari Vajpayee said, “Information technology is commodity prices, income generation activities,
an area of special importance. It has already support services and so forth. However, the rural
revolutionised the world. No country can hope to poor often have a strong oral knowledge tradition,
develop global competitiveness if it ignores which is not easily captured by visual ICTs.
information technology. This is one area where Critical areas requiring work include intellectual
India can quickly establish global dominance. property rights and patent laws and their
India can be fully competitive in this area with enforcement.
tremendous pay-offs in terms of income Governments have an opportunity to explore
generation and creation of high quality jobs.” how best to create an enabling environment to take
The Prime Minister also urged professionals to connectivity to rural and remote areas with the
address themselves to three national tasks – active participation of the private sector. The
increasing the use of Indian languages in Government of India is now making good progress
computers, developing IT applications for rural in interesting the private sector in infrastructure
development and agriculture, and improving the creation (bandwidth, connectivity, VSATs) and
government-citizen interface by using computer has plans to set up community information centres
networks. He also said that there is a need to create in North Eastern states at the block level[3]. In
more and more Indian content, both in English most cities, the Internet is now available at an
and other Indian languages, on the Internet. affordable price through cafes and kiosks with
Vajpayee said that the lack of timely and ready access to a wide-ranging content. Mostly, it
accurate information on weather and crop is the educated and well off who are making best
conditions is a major factor in the current rise in use of this opportunity. Information on issues like
the prices of essential commodities. Hence, the
the rights of labour, land tenure, government
government is considering the setting up of a
policies on informal settlements or programmes
national centre for crop forecasting that requires
aiming at benefiting them are seldom available in a
reliable, widespread IT infrastructure.
format that is tailor-made to meet the needs of the
Furthermore, the application of IT networks for
urban poor. Unlike in rural areas, there are few
rural development and agriculture also needs a
NGOs which address this issue. Of late, some
growing IT culture in such areas. He said the
urban local bodies are making efforts to provide
“wired villages” pilot project, being implemented
information and facilities based on a single window
by the government in Warananagar in Maharashtra
concept with an aim of bringing transparency in
is an attempt to create such a culture.
Taking its cue from the PM’s speech, the local governance. An example of such initiatives is
Government set up the Ministry of Information “Voice” (Vijayawada Online Information Centre).
Technology to bridge the rural-urban divide. The Mirzapur city has used a geographic information
GoI’s Ministry of Information Technology (MIT) system (GIS) platform for the first time in India to
envisages IT providing a unique and new improve revenue by computerising existing
opportunity to improve the economic status of all property tax records and through practical
sections of society. The vision also perceives IT property reassessment. The GIS was also used to
addressing age-old problems in the fields of plan solid waste management and the organisation
education, health, rural development, poverty and management of certain infrastructural
alleviation, and employment, while being a major services. In Hyderabad, the e-Seva (electronic
facilitator for information transparency, good service) project of the government of Andhra
governance, empowerment, participative Pradesh (AP) aims to provide services at a single
management and grass-roots democracy. The point and runs on a self-financing model. The
work of the Vigilance Commission in fighting e-Seva is based on a three-tier architecture:
corrupt practices is an interesting example of the transactions are undertaken on a real time basis;
GoI’s use of ICTs for better governance. the servers of different departments are connected
The poor have information, knowledge and to a central data centre, which is connected to
communication needs, as do all people, yet they different centres across the city; and transactions
are often unable to address them. Promoting ICT done in the e-Seva are recorded directly on the
access for the poor and particularly those in rural server of the department concerned, after due
and remote areas where they may have only a processing or accreditation in the central server.
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Major e-initiatives taken by state masses. The services provided by these centres
governments include commodity/mandi (commodity trading
place) marketing information, issues of copies of
The guidance and support of the central land records, maps, online registration for issue of
government has helped many state governments income, caste, domicile certificates, e-mail in
adopt progressive information technology policies, Hindi language, amongst others (Kothari et al.,
with an emphasis on providing connectivity right 2002).
down to village level. These agencies have taken The Maharashtra government aims to use IT to
steps to ensure the benefits of ICT reach the empower people across socio-economic and
common people everywhere. geographic boundaries. Some of the major projects
The Andhra Pradesh government has taken a include registration and stamp duty, sales tax and
major lead in the past few years to develop the IT transport departments, and treasuries. The
industry and use IT in the process of governance, District Collectorate, Pune, has implemented a
particularly in citizen-oriented services. They have service providing one-point access for citizens to
recently launched schemes like Computer Aided various functions.
Registration of Deeds (CARD), which enables the The Punjab State government believes that IT
Registration department to complete registration services should be outsourced, giving priority to
deeds and return the documents to the public in establishing IT infrastructure for e-mail and voice
just 1 hour. One million documents have been connectivity. A GIS is also being planned with
processed by the system to date. Twin City basic parameters like village database, road
Network Services (TWINS) has been network, irrigation and canal network, power
implemented as a single-counter integrated citizen network.
service, packaging 18 types of services and In a major strategy departure compared to many
networking six departments of the state other states, the Rajasthan government has
government. This service is being replicated at 285 decided to implement most of its e-governance
counters on a Build, Own and Operate (BOO) initiatives on its own without the private sector. An
basis. information system for “mandis” connects 236
The Karnataka government has launched an “mandis” on-line providing daily rates of all the
ambitious IT policy, called “Mahithi”, to take IT “mandis” by 4 p.m. The emphasis of the
benefits to the masses. Mahithi is a two-fold government is on using low-cost solutions and
initiative to grow the IT industry and develop making full use of existing infrastructure and
e-governance. The Bhoomi project is a major resources.
scheme of the government to computerize 190 The Tamil Nadu government announced an IT
lakh land records concerning 60 lakh farmers. The policy as early as 1997. It has laid emphasis on IT
State government has given rights to seven services being provided in local languages. State
companies to establish high-speed networking in government has also organized an international
the state. conference on the standardization of Tamil code
The Kerala government has launched major and keyboard. The government has already given
initiatives in e-governance. Project Information rights to three companies to establish broadband
Kerala is a Rs. 43 crore[4] project to be network infrastructure.
implemented in 1,300 “panchayats” in the state. On the education front, Tamil Nadu aims to
Software for the project covering most of the make all students IT literate. The State has
transactions at panchayat level has been tendered to invite private participation in
developed. Applications have been divided into providing computer science education at all the
three areas: certificates such as birth-death, caste, 1,198 higher secondary schools.
ration card, etc.; social welfare schemes such as The Uttar Pradhesh government planned to
pension, housing schemes, etc.; and subsidies and achieve 100 per cent IT literacy among
incentives. Kerala is also creating a housing portal. government employees by 2002. It decided to
The Gyandoot project is a lead project of the introduce computer education in 100
Madhya Pradesh government under which 21 Intermediate schools. As for IT infrastructure, 70
rural cyber cafes have been established. Each out of 83 districts have optical fibre connectivity.
soochnalaya (information kiosk) provides service In the hill districts, VSATs will be used in the
to about 10-15 grampanchayats (local self future.
government/ local bodies), in 20-30 villages Other State governments like Delhi, Gujarat,
covering a population of 20,000-30,0000. These Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa,
information centres are located at block among others, are in the process of spelling out
headquarters, bazaars (market place), villages and their IT policies. Plans include furthering
bus depot centres for better outreach to the e-governance by the establishment of IT kiosks to
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facilitate interaction with the government. These among rural poor using appropriate
kiosks will be set up at public places such as technologies (e.g. telekiosks).
airports, railway stations and even in slums. .
“Digital Mandi”: an electronic trading
platform for agro-commodities, helping to
form a distributed virtual National
Commodity Exchange system.
NGOs – lifeline to rural development? .
HISAAB (http://hisaab.sourceforge.net) – “a
group level microfinance [MFI] management
NGOs play a crucial role in empowering people framework, intended to document
with information on political, social and economic transactions at the lowest level of MFI
issues through content development and operations.”
networking (e.g. Oneworld, www.oneworld.net/
Voluntary Health, Education and Rural
article/view/67151). NGOs like the MS Development (VHERD); established in 1985 by
Swaminathan Research Foundation, Chennai Kanchi Paramacharya, is a non-profit
(www.mssrf.org), and the Society for organisation, working for the improvement of the
Development Alternatives, Delhi rural poor in different parts of Tamil Nadu, Orissa
(www.indianngos.com/sda), have already begun and Gujarat. The Bio-informatics Centre at
working on providing a range of information and VHERD has the objective of creating a data bank
services to rural areas through hybrid networks on common medicinal plants being cultivated on
and franchised cyber centres involving women commercial scale. Assisted by the Health Ministry,
volunteers. The NIC is rendering laudable services the Medicinal Plants Research and Information
to rural departments through e-commerce Centre has a site at Keelambi near Kancheepuram
products like Rural Bazaar (to help small for a Quality Control Laboratory and an extraction
communities sell their wares) and Rural Soft. plant for medicinal plants analysis. VHERD has
Poor health delivery systems and illiteracy also signed a memorandum of understanding with
exacerbate poverty. Recent experimentation using Satyam Computer Services’ Satyam School of
web-based ICTs such as “Telemedicine” Applied Information System (www.iiit.net/
(www.spsood.com/telemedicineinindia), schools/satyam.php) on e-governance and to
“Doctoranywhere” in health formulate grass roots projects.
(www.doctoranywhere.com), and “Schoolnet” in Self-employed Women’s Association (SEWA,
education (www.schoolnetindia.com), make it www.sewa.org) is an organisation involved in
possible for these services to penetrate into the training, development and self-employment of
remotest areas. In particular, “Schoolnet” is women in the informal sector. Many organisations
promoted by Infrastructure Leasing and Financial dealing with SEWA have created their websites and
Services (IL & FS), a firm which manufactures and are promoting and selling their products online.
promotes educational CD-ROMs for classroom MS Swaminathan Research Foundation,
teachers. However, the challenge for government is located at Pondicherry provides information and
to make such services available to the poor, knowledge to rural masses through wireless radios.
bridging the digital divide. The Swaminathan Foundation’s Village
With Government support, Media Lab Asia Knowledge Centres have also created and
aims to realize Mahatma Gandhi’s vision of a maintained websites in these villages with local
sustainable village created through culturally content.
appropriate use of new technologies The Warana Wired Village Project
(www.iitk.ac.in/MLAsia/infothela). The initiative (www.uncrd.or.jp/ict/warana.html) funded and
is “to create a sustainable digital ecology that supported by the Government of India and the
maintains traditional values and community while state government has an IT infrastructure to
opening up economic and expressive network all cooperatives engaged in “sugar
opportunities. The twin themes of the ‘Digital refining, dairy processing and banking, and retail
Village’ projects are tools that empower invention with a distributed account system developed for
and expression, and advanced financial tools for the sugar cane cooperative”.
rural markets” (www.medialabasia.org)
Some of the initiatives undertaken by this group
are described at: www.medialabasia.org/ Other projects
mlaShow.php?typeId¼4&subTypeId ¼ 14, and Other social sector projects with a notable
include: information dimension are:
.
“Sustainable Access in Rural India” initiative, .
NIIT’s “Hole-in-the-wall” initiative. NIIT a
which aims to show that viable markets exist software company, providing computer
for information and communication services training for urban slum dwellers
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(www.niit.com/niit/corporate/aboutniit/ their own multimedia courseware. The UGC plans


History.asp). to invest Rs 150 crore over the next 5 years in this.
.
Swayam Krishi Sangam (“Self-help union”, Within the capital the first phase of wiring 79
www.sustainableicts.org/levelone/SKSper colleges is almost complete across both the north
cent20Outline.pdf) records transactional and south campuses of Delhi University, using
information on micro-finance, education and self-finance and funding from the Ministry of
health care onto optical ID cards. Information Technology (MOIT). Future plans
.
AsCent (http://ascent.8k.com) has introduced include providing on-line courses and digital
an online advertising and sales programme library resources, and starting a user group for
and promoted CAD/CAM training for knowledge-sharing.
artisans. The recent visit of Microsoft Chairman Mr. Bill
.
Indiagriline (www.worldbank.org/poverty/ Gates to India focused, among many things, on
voices/globcoal/baramati/casestudies/ bridging the digital divide and kick-starting
indiagriline.pdf) is an initiative of the e-learning initiatives in the country. After detailed
company, EID Parry, for online trading and discussions, Microsoft agreed to give $20 million
networking of agricultural commodities and for training the trainers in the e-learning
rural manufacturing. programme, also known as “Shiksha”
.
Pratham (www.pratham.org) is an e-learning (www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2003/05/14/
initiative for underprivileged children, which stories/2003051402841600). Under this, 80,000
has provided children with educational games teachers and 3.5 million students would be trained
on a trial basis. between a period of 3 and 5 years. The
.
E-Gurucool (www.egurucool.com/ collaboration would be done in partnership with
index.html) is a commercial educational the Department of Information Technology
project dealing in both online and offline (www.mit.gov.in).
content, CD-ROMs and TV programmes. E-education initiatives have been taken up by
many states like Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh,
Uttaranchal, Delhi, Mizoram, Maharashtra to
name a few. The Government in these states have
signed an MoU with various private sector
participants to train teachers in IT.
E-learning and online education: making
inroads
The Government has taken the initiative in Conclusion
developing education and e-learning in India,
e.g. through village-level field projects that support Technology has transformed contemporary India.
mass applicable people-friendly technologies. Various initiatives in the field of rural development
In Higher education, the University Grants have been illustrated earlier to show the impact of
Commission’s (UGC) dream project is to link all ICT in rural development and progress. The idea
the 273 Indian universities with an 8 MB/s of such initiatives has been to bring people
(megabytes per second) line. They also want to information, as the rural population has been for
network access to all research journals throughout many years deprived of information. The IT Task
the country. An ambitious project indeed! Force (National Task Force on IT and Software
In a small town called Lohari in Maharashtra, a Development, 1998) set up by the Indian
student of a technical college told the UGC Government, has taken up the job of aiding
Chairman that he was not worried if his Professor personal growth and national growth by using IT
taught him or not as they downloaded materials as a tool and is engaged in the effective articulation
from the Internet. This incident reflected the and dissemination of that vision, so as to create an
UGC’s thinking in reaching out to rural areas. ethos consistent with the needs of an emerging
Each university will be encouraged to establish a knowledge-driven global civilisation. The task
local area network (LAN) to enable connectivity force has also recommended the extensive use of
within the campus and to establish a larger IT in all areas of national economy to make the
network for connecting all colleges under its country a global economy power. The task force’s
jurisdiction. The sites will serve three main vision includes the following elements.
purposes: enabling universities to share library .
The need of the hour for India, with its diverse
resources and research journals, providing cultures and languages is a strategy to boost
teachers and students with access to information learning and the use of IT by using software in
available on the internet and other multimedia Indian languages, and developing local
educational material; and helping teachers develop content for better outreach to the masses.
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.
To offer IT education to all sections of society Notes
and the economy, to ensure better
productivity. In addition, to create an IT- 1 Lakh ¼ 10 to the fifth power, i.e. 100,000.
2 Very Small Aperture Terminal: a small fixed earth station,
based society by promoting understanding of
the essential communication link required to set up a
the necessary legal framework for this society. satellite based communication network.
Therefore, the focus should be on educating 3 “Block” denotes an administrative community unit, higher
the mass on Intellectual Property Rights than the village level, but lower than the district.
(IPRs), information security and safety. 4 Crore ¼ one followed by seven zeros, i.e. 10 million.
.
To develop and provide industrial
infrastructure such as power,
telecommunications and IT facilities, together References
with intellectual infrastructure such as school/
universities for all villages throughout the Kothari, Pandey, Brij Avinadh and Amita, Chudgar (2002),
country, while ensuring that the PC density in “Gyandoot: can it be the harbinger of knowledge?”, India
the country increases by making available PCs Infrastructure Report 2002, Government issues for
commercialisation, 3iNetwork, OUP.
and connectivity at a nominal cost. National Task Force on IT and Software Development (1998),
In this way, India will advance towards its full available at: http://it-taskforce.nic.in accessed on 24
January 2004.
status as a true information superpower of the Vijaya Raghavan, G. and Nair, V.S.M. (2001), “One of the
digital age. greatest discoveries of our times”, Manorama Year Book,
Malayala Manorama Press, p. 32.

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