IT can improve civic life in India: MAIT

IT can improve civic life in India: MAIT

The Industry, government need to act together for achieving intelligent urbanization

CMN Correspondent

Friday, May 15, 2009

BANGALORE, INDIA: The boom of information technology has lead towards the major transformation of the entire world in the recent years. But there are still some lacking areas, where IT fully hasn't laid its hands upon. One such area is urbanization.

“India is an important destination for global companies not only because of its manpower but also it is seen as a place with a lot of innovation. With that we should be able to live in such an environment; therefore it is important to look at the innovation that could improve the citizens' quality of life,” said Susheela Venkataraman, managing director, Internet Business Solution Group, Cisco Systems.

She further added that technology has immense potential for 'intelligent urbanization' for our country.

The country is going to witness faster development in future years; 500 million people would be urbanized within the next five years. There would be emergence of new cities and 60 per cent of population would start living in the cities.

At the 'National Conference on Emerging Business Opportunities and Sustaining Market in Challenging Times' by MAIT, Susheela Venkataraman noted that the five areas where IT can be enabled in intelligent urbanization include buildings, transport, safety and security, energy, and citizen services.

Intelligent urbanization in these areas would help in fostering improved citizen services with a better transformed and managed world.

For example, with intelligent mobility, one can save time, cost as well as energy utility by getting information by being at the same place rather than physical travel.

Technology can also look at coming to aide in saving life of a person if a ambulance gets stuck in a traffic.

But to achieve this model for future, there is requirement of public-private partnership. Intelligent urbanization needs a holistic approach from partners, advisory services, government etc.

“A smarter planet can be created if it is instrumented, inter-connected and intelligent,” said D. Seetharam, VP and country executive- Govt Programs, IBM India.

He further added that the government also plays an important role and has impact on the various sectors of India. It needs to make suitable policies and collaborate with NGOs, private sector, as well the other governments.

S.R Rao, Additional Secretary, e-governance, Ministry of IT, Govt of India in his speech at the conference noted a few e-governance initiatives.

He said, “The initiatives undertaken under the National E-Governance Plan offer a great opportunity to Indian IT companies to join hands with the government in not only improving delivery of public services and governance in the country but also chartering new growth areas for their businesses.”

Rao added that the National E Governance Plan is a Rs. 30,000 crore plan that seeks to establish the core IT infrastructure of State Wide Area Networks (SWAN), State Data Centers (SDC) and 100,000 Common Service Centers (CSCs) across the nation for delivery of services to the citizens.

Most of these projects are being implemented on a public-private partnership model which seeks to leverage the efficiencies of the private sector with the regulatory authority of the government thereby making these projects sustainable and can mean a return on investment for IT companies for a long time to come.

©CyberMedia News

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