New IT goal: All teachers to be wired

The Govt plans an ambitious project to connect all educational institutions to Internet, reports Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Oct 29, 2006, 18:11:00 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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New IT revolution has just started in India, with the government embarking upon an ambitious project to connect all the schools, colleges and universities and provide an Internet enabled computer connection to each teacher in the country.

At the sidelights of a preview of the complete education portal, Sakshat on Sunday, Secretary Education Sudeep Banerjee, said, the government has already decided to provide free Internet connection to five lakh university and college teachers.

"A decision in this regard has been taken by the University Grants Commission," he said. The government has also decided to give them interest free loan to purchase computers. The decision will cost the exchequer Rs 50 crore per annum.

To ensure that even students in government schools can learn from the web, the government has also decided to connect schools and provide Internet facility in 700 cities and towns of the country. "We will implement both the plans before end of this year," Banerjee asserted.

The larger canvass is envisaged from next year when government plans to give a computer with Internet connection to each government schoolteacher and 50 Internet kiosks in each secondary level school.

But, there are some issues for which the government appears to have found answers. The Indian Institute of Sciences is developing a $50 computer whereas research is on in IITs for a $10 computer.

On another constraint of limitations of optical fibre connectivity, the government has planned high-speed Internet signal through satellite, said NK Sinha, Joint Secretary, in-charge of distance education.

The project, a joint effort of HRD ministry, Information Technology ministry, Telecom ministry and ministry of Earth Sciences under the proposed National Mission on Information Technology, is likely to be completed in five years.

HRD ministry will provide content for education through Sakshat portals, to be launched on Monday by President APJ Abdul Kalam, the IT and Telecom ministry will look into the connectivity issues whereas ministry of Earth Sciences will be putting up one lakh IT kiosks in rural India.

"We believe that within three years results will start pouring with improved learning standards in remote parts of the country," Sinha said.

To ensure maximum reach of Sakshat, Sinha said different educational institutions would develop their own version of the portals with 'definite' local influence and study material in regional languages.

Already, four Sakshat portals by IGNOU, NIC, ERNET and Universities has been developed. "We will exchange good practices of any Sakshat portal with others for a continuous improvement in the teaching quality of the portal," he said, estimating that 50 crore Indians will get connected through Sakshat in the next five years.

Email chetan@hindustantimes.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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