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Not yet an e-leader

India's status as a leading global hub for information technology and business process outsourcing industries is acknowledged but the country has a long way to go before it can claim to be really "e-ready." A lack of access to digital technologies for the vast majority of the Indian population has affected India's ratings in international indices. The deficiencies have contributed in large measure to its low rank in the 2006 e-readiness rankings survey of The Economist Intelligence Unit and the IBM Institute for Business Value. National performance in building information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure and the ability of consumers, business, and governments to use it determine the score, which is a function of about a hundred quantitative and qualitative criteria. Although the expansion of telephone services finds creditable mention (there are about 50 million fixed line subscribers and 75 million mobile phone users with robust ongoing growth, according to the report), weak policy initiatives in other areas have resulted in India stagnating at a global rank of 53 among 68 countries surveyed, for the second successive year. The lack of a sound legal and policy environment, reflected by lacunae in spectrum allocation and pricing, has been identified as the cause for shelving of plans to roll out third generation mobile phone networks.

National programmes on digital divide and e-governance can win recognition only if there is measurable progress in providing community access to ICT and electronically enabled public services. The limited effort to create information websites and run pilot e-governance programmes must be replaced by nationally scoped projects that will shift everyday citizen functions online. To start with, there has been a long and frustrating delay in producing a single database of citizens. In its absence, non-standardised databases produced by various departments and organisations have added to the confusion — and to the number of cards citizens must use for various functions. The absence of centralised data has also come in the way of smooth issue of electoral photo identity cards; availing of civic services, transfer of property, and vehicle ownership across States have not been made any easier, and individual income tax-payers do not yet have a full-fledged e-filing facility. It is significant that Denmark, which has been adjudged the most e-ready country, has made the best use of IT for its public sector and for delivery of social services. For users, the ability to participate in an electronic environment is determined by affordable internet and broadband access, and the Ministry of Communications has been unable to deliver on its promise. Only a third of the connections envisaged in the Broadband Policy — three million by December 2005 — have been given; and the goal of seven million connections by 2007 set out in the Tenth Plan documents appears hopelessly out of reach.

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