On 20 May
2018, a press statement
was released regarding the digital advancements being made in the village of Dhanauri
Kalan in Gautam Budh Nagar district, in Uttar Pradesh; one of the villages that
are a part of the DigiGaon Project that involve establishing Common
Service Centres (CSCs) that are set up to increase
the general standard of living for the villagers. "The network of CSCs,
which acts as access points for delivery of digital services, is set to be
expanded to 2.50 lakh (250 thousand) gram panchayats by the year-end", the
Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology, Ravi Shankar Prasad,
said.
Due to the
lack of facilities and resources in remote villages like Dhanauri Kalan,
villagers are forced to go into town for even basic necessities like food and
healthcare. Through CSCs, the government
aims to aid village development to make these facilities more readily available and to provide a number of services including,
banking, health, education, and financial services to the villagers. Prasad stated
that the CSC programme has transformed into a movement of change bringing
services to rural and remote villages through electronic infrastructure.
In the village, the local CSC
established a WiFi choupal which will give people access to the internet at IN₹25
(about US$ 0.37) with 2GB data for 15 days. In addition to affordable internet
access, through other initiatives made
available by the CSCs like a sanitary pad unit run by the women of the village, digital literacy, and a LED bulb factory, the village has been able to
create jobs and generate employment. “It was
heartening to interact with the village women who have set up a sanitary pad
manufacturing unit in Digi Gaon Dhanauri Kalan. This has not only created a
source of livelihood but also promoted awareness about menstrual hygiene,”
Prasad tweeted.
These projects
are the steps that the Ministry has taken to accomplish the objectives of
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Digital India
scheme. Union Minister of Culture, Mahesh Sharma, who was with Ravi Parsad in the village, said, “The CSC
project is providing sustainable digital access to rural communities and are giving the necessary impetus for upliftment
of the rural community”.
"CSCs are working in
1.8 lakh (180 thousand) gram panchayats and very soon it will reach 2.5 lakh (250
thousand) gram panchayats by end of the year,” Prasad said. Positioned as
strategic cornerstones of the Digital India programme, the
CSC programme model has adopted six villages in the country as a part of the
pilot phase. "About 700 digital villages will be established by the
year-end," Prasad noted.
The press statement
describes the DigiGaon or Digital Village programme as “a conceptualised as a
connected village where citizens can avail various e-Services of the Central
Government, State Governments and private
players in a rural and remote village in
the country.” The DigiGaon project, which was launched last year, involved an initial
expenditure budget of about IN₹423 crore (about
US$ 62.1 million) over three years, which included 6 months of an
implementation period and 2.5 years of an operation, a maintenance service and a
delivery phase.
CSCs are an integral part of
the government's Digital India initiative and function as
a single access point for the delivery of services electronically, including
passport and Aadhaar enrolment. CSCS will also provide access to online
government services such as booking train tickets, submission of various forms
and bills.
“These DigiGaons are
projected to be change agents, promoting rural entrepreneurship and building
rural capacities and livelihoods through community participation and collective
action. The digital villages have been equipped with solar lighting facility in
their community centre, LED assembly
unit, sanitary napkin unit (with active participation on Asha and Anganwadi
workers) and Wi-fi choupal (rural Wi-Fi infrastructure and a slew of suitable
applications)”, the press release stated.
The villages
of Piyala
and Dayalpur (in Haryana), Chandankiyari East and Shivbabudih (in Jharkhand)
and Dhanauri Kalan and Sultanpur (in Uttar Pradesh) have been selected to be a
part of the initial pilot project.