The world is increasingly becoming knowledge based. Empowering the poor and the marginalised and rescuing them from social exclusion and poverty starts with providing them with the knowledge they need when they need it. The goal of the development process must be to include every last member of our society, particularly those who are at the margins. This not only broadens the support base for development, it also strengthens the government’s ability to perform its core developmental role

Telecentres are fast emerging as an important tool in this regard. They are public facilities where people can communicate using phones, the Internet, and other forms of ICT, and where they can develop digital skills. Telecentres support the livelihoods of the numerous poor by providing access to important information, extending the development of technical and business skills, giving better access to government services and to financial resources, and aiding the activities of small entrepreneurs.

Telecentres are key programmes and policy instruments used by governments to extend the much desired social and economic benefits to the downtrodden thereby reducing the digital divide. Telecentres are increasingly concentrating on providing access to ICT and on developing basic ICT skills. Use of modern ICT gadgets like the mobile phones and net access are helping to narrow the digital bridge between the rich nations and emerging economies. A decline in the cost of information and communication technology (ICT) has extended its use by the poor, who capitalise especially on information obtained by telephone to support livelihoods in agriculture and various small businesses.

The role of ICT in Governance Sphere is to improve quality of governance products and services being currently provided, provide new governance services and products, enhance participation of people in choice & provision of governance products & services, bring new sections of society under the governance sphere. Digital Governance or E-governance is being increasingly emphasised as a ‘tool’ for good governance and human development. If implemented strategically e-governance can help to improve efficiency, accountability and transparency of government processes, and can also be a tool to empower citizens by enabling them to participate in the decision-making processes of governments. It uses ICT to induce changes in the delivery and standards of governance services and enables citizens to become pro-active. To make this happen, the inter-related issues of social, financial and digital inclusion have to be addressed in a holistic manner.

Telecentre networks around the world have prioritised the need for skills development among telecentre managers as they are the key link between promoting the services offered at telecentres at the community level and interfacing with service providers to fulfill the customers’ needs.

In the recent years, IT skills have become essential for job advancement and starting a business throughout the world. As a result, there is tremendous demand to provide lifelong learning opportunities in these new skills for adults, youth, and disadvantaged populations. Telecentres and other community based NGOs have emerged as a major force to address this critical need.

The world is becoming aware of this change becoming a global phenomenon. A number of international governing bodies are playing their crucial role in this regard.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight goals to be achieved by 2015 that respond to the world’s main development challenges. MDG 8 focuses on the power and potential of global partnerships to address fair and equitable market access and debt relief, youth employment opportunities, increased access to affordable essential drugs and access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) to bridge the digital divide.

In the Indian context, telecentres (specifically those run by the government) have mainly been perceived as tools of e-governance. A new wave of optimism has dawned on Indian villages. Things are changing, slowly. E-governance initiatives are bringing about a quiet revolution in these belts. Many companies have been reaching out to rural areas and there is a growing demand for complex operations. Students go to virtual education centres in their villages where a two-way interaction programme is held. We can find farmers logging on to websites through internet kiosks to find the market prices of their crops and to check out the weather, all in the local language. Some private companies are taking the initiative to set up telemedicine centres equipped with video cameras and high speed optic fibre cables in regions where proper healthcare facilities are not available.

Accelerating growth of Telecentres in India:

The recent Dataquest-IDC e-governance survey identified Delhi, Goa, Chhattisgarh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala as the five best e-governed states of 2007. The next five positions were bagged by Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Punjab.

3i Infotech, a global information technology company headquartered in Mumbai, has started e-governance initiatives in rural areas. They have developed Citizen Service Centres (CSCs) along with the Indian government.

N-Logue Communications, a Chennai-based company, focuses on rural internet to bridge the digital divide. The company has launched internet and voice services in rural areas. The project is run by TeNet group of IIT Madras.

“Telecentres on wheels” is the name of a six month experimental project for remote villages in West Bengal (India) launched in 2007 by the Change Initiatives, a rural Indian NGO, with the initiative and support from UNESCO and the West Bengal Renewable Energy Development Agency. TOW is a customised tricycle equipped with a solar panel and necessary hardware, such as laptop computer, printer, power panels, etc.

Comat is another company which provides egovernance services to villages. It has covered over one lakh villages. One billion citizen related records have been procured by them. There are around 1,250 rural telecentres maintained by Comat in Karnataka, Haryana and Tripura

Some of the more famous telecentres in India are Akshaya (Kerala), Rural E-Seva (West Godavari- Andhra Pradesh) & Bangalore One (Bangalore). They are described as ‘one stop shops’ where one accesses services like utility bill payment, procurement of digitized land ownership records and obtaining birth and death certificates.

Around the world, some telecentres include NGO-sponsored, local government, commercial, school-based, and university-related .

Despite the developmental potential, very few governments in the developing nations have come forward in implementing e-government strategically directly targeting poor people. This is despite the fact that more than 60 percent of the population in the Asia-Pacific region lives in rural areas and the majority of them are poor.

ICTs have a vital role to play in realising the grand vision of inclusion for all sections of society. But the question is do we have the vision and foresight to make this happen. In absence of political will, the impact of electronic governance models will be weak and may not lead to qualitative change in governance processes. Greater onus lies on civil society organizations to build strong citizens movement to either create a political will or to bring about a change in leadership.

Filed under: Telecentres