In a show of support towards the government’s Digital India push, members of India Inc on Wednesday announced a total investment of Rs 4.5 lakh crore towards various projects which their companies would be undertaking in the next few years.
In a show of support towards the government’s Digital India push, members of India Inc on Wednesday announced a total investment of Rs 4.5 lakh crore towards various projects which their companies would be undertaking in the next few years. It is estimated that the various projects and initiatives unveiled by the government and the private sector companies would offer employment to over 18 lakh people in the next five to 10 years while driving digital inclusion throughout the country.
“This is just the amount that people on the dais have announced, but there are many more who are working in this direction,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said while applauding the initiatives by the industry and highlighting the need for digital revolution in the country, saying it is necessary to deal with problems like corruption, help provide transparent and efficient governance and bridge the rich-poor divide.
Modi talked about building digital highways, and said there will be establishments where there is optical fibre network. He talked of taking broadband connectivity to villages and farmers. “Until we take the services to the millions of farmers in the villages, we will not be able to uplift the nation,” he said. Modi said that the digital divide is a bigger evil than the gap between rich and poor.
The Prime Minister urged netizens to communicate with the government through social media, and said that very soon “e-governance will turn into m-governance, and everything that the government has to offer will be available over the mobile phone”.
The Indira Gandhi Stadium, the venue of the event, was packed; the turn-out was expected to be close to 10,000 people, and there were 12 chairmen and CEOs of India’s biggest and most powerful companies.
Sunil Mittal, chairman of the Bharti group, announced Rs 1,00,000 crore of investment over the next five years to create deeper infrastructure in rural and urban India, and in areas of e-health and e-education. He also said, “We will help in creating electronic manufacturing to reduce the burden of imports into the country.”
Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani said that Jio, Reliance’s greenfield telecom venture, will be working with manufacturers for made-in-India mobility devices, and committed that it will be distributed through the company’s distribution network. Ambani announced investments of R2,50,000 crore, a part of which will go into building a retail network of 1.5 lakh stores, and another part to set up a start-up fund.
Aditya Birla Group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla said that through Idea Cellular, it will create the infrastructure that is required to aid Digital India. He announced an R42,000 crore ($7 billion) over the next five years in the field of network rollout, building broadband network, investments in WiFi, mobile wallets, in areas of mobile-based education and healthcare, and in creating a digitally enabled township in the suburbs of Mumbai.
Vedanta Group chairman Anil Agarwal proposed an investment of R40,000 crore to set up a LCD panel fab unit, which he expects will employ 50,000 people and reduce India’s electronic imports by 20%. Delta Corportaion’s CEO Ping Ching announced investments of R3,000 crore ($500 million) in electronic manufacturing, and ADAG’s Anil Ambani committed R10,000 crore in areas of cloud infrastructure and telecom. Nidec’s Katayama, said his company will invest R6,000 crore ($1 billion) to set up factories over the next 10 years.
New policies that would bridge the digital divide in India were also announced — the ESDM policy that will aim at bringing down imports to zero by 2020, the EDF policy and the e-Governance policy.
Major launches by the govt
Products
Digital Locker: It is aimed at minimising the usage of physical documents and enabling sharing of e-documents across agencies and individuals. Hassle-free registration can be done for SIM cards, LPG connections and driving licences. It will speed up issuance of certificates such as birth, marriage and domicile. One can store and share important documents such as PAN cards, passports and educational certificates.
National Scholarship Portal: Unique log-in ID and password for all stakeholders. The scholarship will be disbursed to the bank accounts of students. A status update on mobile at every step of disbursement.
eHospital: Online Registration Services: Citizens can avail of online services such as registration and appointment, pay fees, view diagnostic reports and check blood availability.
eSign: eSign offers the functionality to authenticate signers and perform the digital signing of documents using Aadhaar eKYC service (biometric or OTP) while submitting documents to agencies. Hardware tokens are not required to be used.
Digitise India Platform: This initiative would facilitate efficient delivery of services and reduce piles of paper in record rooms of offices. The government’s files and documents, which are shareable and useful to citizens, would be digitised through “crowd sourcing” and citizens can earn money by participating in it.
Portals/Apps
MyGov Mobile App: Through this innovative platform, the government encourages citizens to participate in policymaking by giving ideas and suggestions. As many as 211 issues have been put up for discussion in the MyGov.in web platform since July 2014.
Swachh Bharat Mission App: This mobile app will resolve the issues and challenges faced by citizens and government organisations while taking swachhata (cleanliness) pledge and uploading of responses (images or videos) in the Swachh Bharat campaign on MyGov.
BharatNet: It is the world’s largest rural broadband connectivity project using optical fibre to connect each of 2.5 lakh gram panchayats with a minimum of 100 Mbps bandwidth. Bharatnet will serve as the infrastructure backbone of Digital India, to facilitate delivery of e-Governance, e-Health, e-Education, e-Banking, internet and various other services.
Wi-Fi Hotspots: BSNL has launched Wi-Fi services at 78 hotspots over 17 locations across 6 cities to provide affordable, anywhere and anytime, high-speed broadband services while on the move. About 2,500 hotspots are planned to be set up by BSNL in FY16. These would essentially be in tourist destinations and government buildings dealing with people’s issues.
Next Generation Network (NGN): NGN technology will converge public switched telephone network, data network and wireless mobile network to enable high speed broadband across the country. This would provide for the first time value-added services such as video chats, video conferencing and other services now available on mobile phone on fixed line telephone at nominal prices.
Institutions
Centre for Flexible Electronics: The National Centre for Flexible Electronics is an initiative of the Centre to promote research and innovation in the area of flexible electronics. The electronics emerging from this technology can be fabricated on substrates that are plastics, paper, textiles or metal foils.
Centre of Excellence for Internet of Things (IoT): IoT is the emerging technological advancement in IT/ITeS sector, which is expected to swamp the connected digital world. The Centre of Excellence for IoT is expected to promote a vibrant IoT ecosystem, helping India attain a leadership role in the filed.
Policy
Electronics Development Fund Policy: The objective of this policy is to create a self-sustaining eco-system of venture funds that shall fill the gap currently seen in the domains of early stage angel funding and venture funding in the technology areas of electronics, nano-electronics and IT. It will facilitate the flow of risk capital to both industry and academia to undertake research and development in these technology areas.