Launch and the Curtain Raiser of eINDIA 2010, India's Largest ICT event, took place in New Delhi at The Claridges, witnessing presence of many distinguished guests. The event is set to take place from 4-6th August at Hyderabad International Convention Centre, Hyderabad, India. The organisers of the event include Centre for Science Development and Media Studies (CSDMS) and Elets Technomedia Pvt. Ltd. The programme is being co-organised by Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications & IT, Government of India; Directorate General of Employment & Training (DGET), Ministry of Labour & Employment, Government of India and National eGovernance Plan. The host state partner for the event is IT & Communication Department, Government of Andhra Pradesh. And the country partner for the event is Sri Lanka. The evening was glorified with presence of esteemed panelists who formally launched eINDIA 2010 brochures and inaugurated a Power Panel discussion, titled as 'Digital India in the Making – Opportunities and Challenges'. Dr. Ravi Gupta, Executive Director, Centre for Science Development and Media Studies (CSDMS), made a welcome presentation and invited the eminent dignitaries to formally launch eINDIA 2010. He mentioned that eINDIA 2010 takes a “Glocal” approach where it encompasses both local flavor and international seasoning, in context of ICT4D (Information and Communication Technology for Development).
The keynote address was delivered by Shri R Chandrashekhar, Secretary, Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications & Information Technology, Government of India. He spoke about many issues including scaling up of many Indian sectors, transformations taking place in field of web technology and issues related to Web2.0. He informed the participants that eINDIA has grown in its magnitude and scale since its inception and congratulated Dr. MP Narayanan, President, CSDMS, and his team for the same. He spoke about the need of convergence of different domains of governance, health and education in the second phase of e-Governance going on currently. The panelists at the session included Dr. R S Sharma, Director General, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI); Savitur Prasad, Secretary IT, Government of NCT of Delhi; Dr. R Sreedhar, Director, Commonwealth of Learning; S Reghunathan, Former Member, National Knowledge Commission; and Prof. V N Rajasekharan Pillai, Vice Chancellor, Indira Gandhi National Open University.
R S Sharma termed the current phase of development as the third phase of development. According to him the first phase was when individual states were doing their isolated IT projects. The second phase was ushered in with the NeGP, which tried to integrate the individual IT projects at the National level. He supported eINDIA as an event of relevance, in context of ICT4D. He mentioned about him witnessing all previous eINDIA events. He also announced that he would be happy to conduct a few sessions on Unique Identification (UID), to clear the issues people have on UID implementation. Prof. V N Rajasekharan Pillai mentioned that eINDIA 2010 is a platform that has given us opportunity to carry out deliberations on issues such as inter-sectoral convergence in context of ICT4D and it has been of immense support to IGNOU as a platform. Additionally, IGNOU wants to support eINDIA 2010 in its various initiatives. S Regunathan, Former Member, National Knowledge Commission observes, 'We often wonder to have an event like eINDIA. I feel that, at this point in time, education and training in the areas of IT and ICT is indispensable and unavoidable and eIndia keeps us updated about it every year. It is only through IT that government departments and personnel can reach out to people for each and every issue. Had the CRPF Jawans knowledge about the Internet properly and knowing about e-Map, the recent massacre would have been avoided.'
Savitur Prasad spoke on how the latest technologies eg. 3-D mapping and TETRA (Terrestrial Trunked Radio) are being applied for the security of Delhi and its citizens. This could be a model for other government agencies in the country. Dr. Ashok Kumar, DDG and Director, Central Bureau of Health Intelligence, Government of India says, ' With the help of ICT, India has ushered in a new paradigm that looks promising than ever before and the healthcare services is nowhere exception in that. We are planning to open community service centres to access as many people as we can but its seems to be a challenge. We felt the need to start the project at the ground level where the peripheral workers at the community centres will have a key role to play. Therefore, every Panchayat is aimed to be connected and will be covered in the scheme.'
Dr. R Sreedhar spoke about success of previous eINDIA events. It is a platform, according to him that provided individuals and institutions, from across domains to share their thoughts, views and best practices. eINDIA will see their support and participation from different Commonwealth countries. They would also like to see a session addressing issues in education sector on quality, access and excellence. eINDIA 2010 will be the exhibition host to some of the latest e-solutions, services, initiatives and case studies from across India and beyond. Over 120 exhibitors from professional service providers, technology vendors, consulting firms, government agencies and national/international development organizations will participate in the exhibition. For more details on eINDIA 2010, contact: Anaam Sharma Elets Technomedia Pvt. Ltd. Mobile: +91-9910597744, anaam@eindia.net.in G-4, Sector 39, Noida, UP, India, Phone: +91-120-2502180-85 Fax: +91-120-2500060. www.eindia.net.in
