This new year, get personalised e-cards from PM Modi

Marking the New Year on a different note, millions of Indians would get a personalised greeting card from the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the New Year’s Eve with a message that in 2015 the government will aim to connect entire country on a digital platform either through broadband or mobile phones.

Updated on: Oct 17, 2014, 07:09:59 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Marking the New Year on a different note, millions of Indians would get a personalised greeting card from the Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the New Year’s Eve with a message that in 2015 the government will aim to connect entire country on a digital platform either through broadband or mobile phones.

Modi in his Independence Day speech had emphasised on “Digital India” as key to transform the country and bring in transparency in governance. Though Digital India, the government aims to bring all public services on a common digital platform and create knowledge empowered society.

The Digital India Mission will get a fillip from the Prime Minister on the New Year’s eve to elaborate on “connecting nation any-time anywhere” with special emphasis on linking every village in India with a broadband connection. In addition, the government will also focus on ensuring internet through mobile phones.

“The telecom commission has already approved money for mobile connectivity in remote areas and the work has already started,” an official said. “We are looking at end of 2015 to provide mobile connectivity in every village”.

The government sources said the Prime Minister was keen to make Digitial India a platform for providing corruption free governance with total transparency to the lowest level. The department of Information Technology has been directed by the Prime Minister’s Office to fasten the implementation process and said the funds would not be a bottleneck for the flagship programme of the government.

Finance minister Arun Jaitley had allocated Rs 200 crore for the programme in his budget for a kick-start and more money will come in the next budget.
As these steps are being taken, the PM would be delivering is a message to people across India embarking on nation connected anytime-anywhere. The IT ministry through the web-portal mygov.in has sought design from people of the e-greeting card that the PM would be emailing.

Before the New Year, Prime Minister Modi is also expected to interact with people through All India Radio (AIR) before the eve with his broad message for 2015. The officials, however, said the details of the same were to be worked out.

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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