Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union Minister of Law & Justice, Communications and Electronics & Information Technology released a series of new initiatives by Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) in the first MeitY Start-up Summit held on October 21 in New Delhi.
Talking on the event, Prasad focused on the development of the ‘Digital India‘ scheme. He further explained the possibility of Digital India which depends basically on three premises. According to him, Digital India, Make in India, startup India, Smart cities are all technology-based programmes designed to reform.
He further stated that Digital India aims to bridge the gap between digital haves and have-nots across the country.
He said, “Entities such as NIC and STPI have to play a crucial role. Buoyed by concerted efforts over the years, Digital India is now having a global resonance with many countries wanting to emulate the model.”
Stressing the importance of JAM (Jan Dhan Aadhaar Mobile) Trinity, Prasad said, “With 1.24 billion Aadhar cards, 1.2 billion mobile phones are riding its own story of success in the digital inclusion. eNam, e-Visas, Digital payments all have shown tremendous maturity and growth.”
Speaking about the significance of start-ups and the Government of India’s initiatives, Prasad mentioned that steps are being taken up to include startups in the e-procurement portal of GoI.
The MeitY Minister also laid emphasis upon the requirement for enabling normal ladies of India for a fruitful advanced consideration process. Commemorating the success of women entrepreneurs, he said that the present honours are a celebration of their commitment to facilitate innovation. The rundown of women awardees in six topical territories of innovation strengthening is joined.
With an end goal to permeate the vision of Digital India to arrive at level 2, 3 4 and mofussil towns of India 200 BPOs are currently working crosswise over India. Imphal, Patna, Malda, Bareilly, Jalgaon Ghaziabad are a portion of the spots where these focuses have been opened. He admonished MeitY to turn out with advanced indexing of indigenous items with an exceptional accentuation on items created by provincial craftsmen.
In a bid to strengthen the IT infrastructure in villages, as many as 1.25 lakh Gram Panchayats have been connected by optical fibre. There are one lakh digital villages with wifi connectivity and Common Service Centres (CSCs).
Regarding the Technology Incubation and Development of Entrepreneurs (TIDE) scheme, Prasad talked about the recent achievements in the promotion of startups of India. He also said that with TIDE 2.0 more avenues would open up for startups.
Towards the end, the Union Minister said that India must turn into a gigantic focus of programming items and the central point for protected innovation.