Rural India witnessing IT revolution

India's rural economy is becoming the new growth engine for
Information Technology. This was announced at the SKOCH Ninth Annual Summit
Challengers 2006.

Minister for Panchayati Raj, Mani Shankar Aiyer said that the
rural areas of the country are now witnessing an IT revolution with the
implementation of the e-governance projects. He said that implementation of the
e-governance projects have proved to be beneficial for the common man to access
the services.

MANI SHANKAR AIYER: Rural areas witnessing an IT revolution with the implementation of the e-governance projects

SKOCH survey stated that the power of IT has proved to have
made much more impact in the rural regions compared to the urban. The survey was
carried out on 37 e-governance projects spread across 11 states.

"The survey conducted over a period of two years and
rated these projects on various parameters. The rural e-governance projects were
rated 8.67 compared to 8.03 for the urban projects," Sameer Kochhar, CEO,
SKOCH Consultancy Services, said.

Kochhar said that that infusion of ICT has enabled the rural
delivery systems work for the benefit of the unreachable rural masses. He said
that India is about projects that scale, like the e-Panchayat, Rural e-Seva and
Wadi.

CB Bhave, Chairman and MD, National Securities Depository
Limited (NSDL), was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award, for his contribution
in spearheading a mechanism to trade in dematerialized securities and shares.

Bhave's NSDL has been chosen by the Finance Ministry to implement the Tax
Information Network. There were also awards for the category for citizen service
delivery, education, rural delivery system, replication projects and IT and
development.

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