The Hindu : Business : Golden Nica Award presented

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Saturday, Sep 17, 2005

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Golden Nica Award presented

Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Golden Nica Award won by the Akshaya project of Kerala was presented to P. H. Kurien, secretary of IT Department of Kerala at a function held at Linz in Austria by Franz Morak, Secretary of State for Culture, Arts and Media of Austrian Government, according to official information released here.

The Akshaya Project was selected for the Golden Nica award of Prix Ars Electronica in the digital community category. Akshaya is among the six winners of Prix Ars Electronica award this year instituted by the Austria-based Ars Electronica a platform for digital arts and media.

The winners of six Golden Nicas, 12 awards of distinction and 73 honorary mentions were selected by a seven member jury. Ars Electronica said in a release that Akshaya is one of the most ambitious development programmes ever launched to take advantage of information and communication technologies.

The district Malappuram was last year declared India's first e-literate district (100 per cent households) with Akshaya accomplishing a computer literacy campaign, covering 650,000 households representing more than 3.6 million people in the district. The entire district, the largest in the State with undulating terrain, has been networked under state-of-art wire-free broad band internet connectivity. Akshaya, which was inaugurated by the President A. P. J. Abdul Kalam in 2002, has been extended to seven more districts - Kollam, Pathanamthitta, Ernakulam, Thrissur, Kozhikode, Kannur and Kasaragod.

In the second phase, each unit would be allowed to open two to three sub-centres, covering 3.5 million households and involving 611 local self-governments.

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