IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

Kerala is on the cusp of immense opportunities owing to the provision in the draft National IT Policy, 2011, to focus more on tier-II and tier-III cities, say industry experts.

“Major IT hubs like Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune and NCR, which account for nearly 90 per cent of India's IT industry, are near-saturated. They face infrastructural challenges and human resource constraints for further expansion. Hence Indian IT and ITES industry has to shift focus to tier-II and tier-III cities,” the draft policy observes.

The new policy aims at creating a knowledge-based economy with global opportunities. Developing ‘IT@Kerala’ as the most preferred IT/ITeS investment destination in India is its another goal. It also aims at attracting investments in the ICT.

As per the new policy, the government will simplify labour laws to suit the needs of IT&ITeS companies. This will help to overcome the barriers pertaining to employment in the industry. General permission will be granted to all IT&ITeS companies to have 24x7 operations.

Mobile telephony and online services are the major aspects of the new policy. "We want to have a paperless government office," he said, adding that use of Marathi would be mandatory in e-governance services.

"The Cabinet has recently approved the National Policy on Information Technology 2012," ministry of communications and information Thursday said in an official statement.

The new policy would focus on faster development of the electronics and hardware sector, making human resources available to the IT set-ups, developing infrastructure for IT industry as well as some sops for the investors, official sources said.

Q: Before leading the IT department, you have been associated with many technologyrelated interventions in the state for the past several years. How would you rate your state’s progress towards an e-Ready state?

Globally reputed consultant PricewaterhouseCoopers which was roped in by the state government to spell the future e-governance roadmap has prepared its report on 21 departments. The report is an overview of the preparedness of these departments to implement e-governance initiatives. The report has also shed light on the manpower and hardware requirement for such departments.

The Odisha Computer Application Centre (OCAC) under the IT Department with the assistance of technical consultants has prepared the draft policy on e-governance. The meeting discussed the roadmaps prepared by 21 departments for implementation of e-governance.

Union Ministry of Communications and Information Technology held a round table conference with the stakeholders to deliberate upon the draft national information and communication technology (ICT) Policy 2011 on Tuesday in the Capital.

Opening the deliberations, Kapil Sibal, Union Minister of Communications and Information Technology said that the Department of Information Technology (DIT) seeks to achieve the objectives of equity and empowerment by using ICT to touch and transform lives of citizens. “The endeavour is not only to promote the growth of IT Industry – but to use ICT for empowering citizens and ensuring transparency and accountability in governance through reliable and efficient delivery of public services,” he stated.

According to the state IT department’s policy note, which was placed by state IT minister N Subramanian, currently there are nearly 350,000 professional employed in about 1,750 IT and IT-enabled (ITeS) companies in the state.

Software exports from the state, which stood at Rs.42,100 crore in 2010-2011, are expected to touch Rs 48,000 crore in 2011-2012. All efforts are being made to attract more IT/ITeS investments in the state.

There’s a dog-eared saying among Internet and telecommunication veterans. In the digital world a week is akin to a month and a month is a year. Thirteen years, then, is an era. No wonder the National Telecom Policy 2012, which has replaced the policy of 1999, has generated such a lot of buzz. Most of the attention has centered on the proposed one-time spectrum fee, delinking of spectrum from licence, spectrum sharing, trading, re-farming and pooling and licence renewal fee. The last has not been heard on spectrum pricing as the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is slated to present a detailed analysis to the Department of Telecom (DoT) before the ministerial meeting on June 5, 2012.

A 45th action sets out governance arrangements to ensure that progress is appropriately monitored.

The strategy, launched today by the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin, TD, is aligned closely with the Public Service Reform Plan.

Rabbitte, who will unveil the strategy officially later this morning, explained to media that digital contributes 4.4pc to Ireland’s GDP (€7.1bn) and this is growing at 16pc a year – more than 10 times the rate of growth of the economy as a whole.

Our policymakers talk a lot about the role acquisition of ICT skill sets - and continued upskilling - would play in ramping the national economy to the global knowledge economy. We seem to understand that our e-governance initiatives would both push and pull dissemination of the baseline technologies and practices inherent to mastery.

Most of these developments have been mostly pushed by the consumer demands and need to keep up with the global business environment.

In 2006, the government had a plan whose focus was on building infrastructure to connect Kenyans to the internet. Thus, one fibre optic cable was welcome. That was then, now there are four fibre optic cables live in the country, a fifth one is expected to land very soon and two more later.

The Kenyan government has launched the country’s first National e-Health Strategy aimed at ensuring health information is provided to the right person at the right place and time to support quality and efficient healthcare.

Medical Services Minister Professor, Anyang Nyong’o said the development of the e-Health Strategy comes at an important time when the health sector is implementing far reaching reforms to realize the right to health enshrined in the Constitution.

“We have forged linkages with counties to help them develop ICT master-plans in line with the central government’s directive to digitize public services,” Kenya ICT Authority said the Marketing Director, Eunice Kariuki said in Nairobi.

She spoke to Xinhua during the announcement of ConnectedKenya 2014 conference to be held in mid April in the coastal city of Mombasa.

The 25th Information and Culture month falls in June. The Ministry of Public Administration and Security (MOPAS) of Korea and the National Information Society Agency (NIA) will jointly host a ceremony on June 4 to celebrate the 25th Information and Culture month. Along with the ceremony, a variety of events will be held such as 2012 Information Festival, exhibitions of information & communications assistive devices, musicals promoting a sound information culture. Though such events are designed to promote the Internet and digital information ethics, art education and physical training will also be offered to close the information gap between individuals and regions and to help children have a taste of various recreational cultures other than the Internet. A slew of events are scheduled to be held throughout June to mark the 25th Information and Culture month.