The Power of 1.1 bn

The IT Secretary to the Government of India, R
Chandrashekhar, has perhaps one of the most challenging jobs on his hand. At a
recent meeting with him, the secretary very lucidly outlined the agenda that the
Government of India has entrusted on him and his Department of IT (DIT).

While the big IT players of India, by virtue of their size
and brand, may already have access to key government policy makers, I thought I
will share my notes of the meeting with the rest of the IT fraternity including
SMEs, CIOs, and e-gov stake holders. The biggest short term challenge, according
to me, is that the government wants to once again take up the case of ICT
hardware manufacturing. Though the industry had almost given up on
manufacturing, but keeping in mind the recent China scare (Home Ministry of
India wants to keep track of all Chinese made telecom and networking equipments
in the country), the government has decided to once again push hardware
manufacturing in India.

Government believes that since India is very strong in R&D
and design, the next logical step should be manufacturing. The secretary also
hinted at the possibility of a new initiative for hardware manufacturing to be
announced soon. I am not sure how many of us in the industrywhich believes that
India missed the manufacturing bus long backwill get convinced.

The next biggest challenge before Chandrashekhar is
e-governance deployment. To this effect, the government is also quite clear that
it will also deploy e-gov for G2B (government to business) services so that the
industry gets a sense of trust and transparency.

The ground situation is a bit different. At a recent state
sponsored advertisement issued by the governments of Bihar and Rajasthan, in
most of the national dailies, among the list of achievements there is not a word
on some of the e-gov related activities that these states are doing. Either it
is not important or nothing has been achieved. Either ways, the news is not too
good.

The third thing on the governments agenda is information
security. DIT is working on elaborate plans with other ministries on building
and strengthening information security systems (including that involved in
homeland security).

Last but not the least, Chandrashekhar will also drive
Indias R&D strengths in a new direction. The challenge will be to create a
encouraging and conducive environment for those in the private sector.

I must add that this is surely a tough road ahead. So,
even if Chandrashekhar succeeds in achieving 50% of that, he would have achieved
a lot. This will give India a new lever to harness the power of its 1.1 bn
citizens and emerge as a global leader.

Ibrahim Ahmad

ibrahima@cybermedia.co.in