Conference Report

egov India 2006 | Conference Report 1

Conference Report

Mani Shankar Aiyer, Union Minister, presenting ‘egov Innovation Award-2006’ to B. Dayananda, IPS,SP, Dakshina Kannada district (Karnataka), for setting up the first-ever police blog in India.

egov India 2006 was third in theseries of e-Government conferencesorganised by the Centre for

Science, Development and Media Studies(CSDMS), following those in New Delhiin 2005 and Bangkok in 2006. Theconference was held at Hotel Taj Palace,from 23-25 August 2006 in New Delhi, andwas co-organised by the Department ofInformation Technology (DIT), Govern-ment of India (GoI), and UNDP. Theconference set out to address theemerging issues in e-Governance anddebate on National e-Governance Plan(NeGP) in India. There was participationof a large conglome-ration of e-Government experts and practitionersfrom government, private sector andacademia. It brought together differentstakeholders on one platform throughkeynotes, papers, special work-shops andexhibition, and provided an opportunityto interface with private sector players,practitioners, government executives,decision-makers and experts.

egov India 2006 was supported byUSAID, UNESCO, The Asia Foundation,American India Foundation, APERA,Bellanet, Gesci, ISPAI, InternationalAcademy of CIO (Thailand), KoreaAgency for Digital Opportunity &Promotion, NASSCOM Foundation,NISG, NIC, CDAC, Plan International,Quest, SDC, SIDA, SEAMEO,Telecentre.org and Telecentres of theAmericas. There was a good participationby private sector companies as sponsors,advertisers and exhibitors of theconference. These included NORTEL,Telelogic, HP, SAP, Symantec, SAS,ALCATEL, Adobe, NIIT, Canon, Sun,WIPRO, Cisco, Vidyatech, Liqvid,Remittag, Metalearn, Educomp, Learnet,SMART, Microsoft, IBM, Hiwel, TLS, 24X7Learning, Inkroma, Yes Bank, ComputerAssociates, Tulip, Tally, Saksham, Gilat,Intel, Designmate, Spanco, Edurite andUnited Telecom.

The conference saw the participation

of more than 500 delegates, representingvarious key policy makers from govern-ment departments, multilateral andbilateral agencies, academic institutions,NGOs and the IT industry.

Among the government function-aries, the speakers included Mani ShankarAiyer, Union Minister of Panchayati Rajand Youth Affairs and Sports; JainderSingh, Secretary, DIT, GoI; KraisornPornsutee, Permanent Secretary, Ministryof Information and CommunicationTechnology, Thailand; R. Chandra-shekhar, Additional Secretary, DIT, GoI;Wajahat Habibullah, Chief InformationCommissioner of India; besides othersenior GoI officials from variousministries. IT Secretaries from differentState Governments also participated.Several NGOs also attended theconference, which included NationalInstitute of Smart Government (NISG),International Development ResearchCooperation (IDRC), Swiss Agency forDevelopment and Cooperation (SDC), e-Governments Foundation, Evangelical

Social Action Forum (Kerala) etc.Jainder Singh, Secretary, DIT, GoI,

inaugurated the conference. On theinaugural day, Mani Shankar Aiyer,Union Minister of Panchayati Raj andYouth Affairs & Sports (GoI) presentedthe ‘egov Award For Innovation - 2006’to B. Dayananda, IPS, Superintendent ofPolice, Dakshina Kannada district fromMangalore, for his initiative in launchingthe first-ever police blog in India to keeppublic and media informed and provideaccess to police related information. Thesite features Kannada and English fontsin order to make the blog user-friendlyand accessible. In his acceptance addressDayananda stated, “The initial plan wasto help save time and resources involvedin informing the media about cases anddevelopments. Some of the details givenon the blog, updated almost on a dailybasis, include a drug bust and coverageof the recently concluded panchayat polls.Even relevant photos are published onthe blog. The blog is easily accessible toall. With this, authentic and official

2 egov India 2006 | Conference Report

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Inauguration of the conference Mani Shankar Aiyer, Union Minister of Panchayati Raj, Youth

Affairs & Sports, Government of India addressing the auidence

Jainder Singh, Secretary, Department of Information Technology,

Government of India delevering keynote address

Delegates going through CSDMS publications Maxine Olson, Jainder Singh and Kriason Prosuntee at the

exhibition

R Chandrashekhar, Addl. Secretary, DIT, Government of India

replying to the audience query


Session in progress Delegates at the conference

Memento presentation to a panelist CSDMS team

Dr M P Narayanan, President

CSDMS

Maxine Olson, UNDP India, Country

Representative delevering keynote

address

Adrian Marti, Deputy Country Head

Swiss Agency for Development and

Cooperation (SDC). Geneva

Kraisorn Pornsutee, Permanent Secretary,

Ministry of Information & Communication

Technology, Thailand

Kiran Karnik, President

NASSCOM

Ravi Gupta, Director

CSDMS

4 egov India 2006 | Conference Report

information of the department can begiven to the press and the people swiftly.The blog is serving well as a medium todisseminate information on the recentfindings and criminal cases.”

The conference comprised 3 days ofplenary and parallel speaker sessions,including keynote speeches fromMinisters, Chief Information Secretaryand IT Secretaries. The conference wasstructured into plenary sessions, mainsessions and parallel track. The firstplenary session was titled ‘India’s e-Government Journey: Where can Indiabe in 2010’, aimed at framing an e-Government vision session to provide astrong focus on what is to be achieved byIndia in five years. The objective of thissession was to provide a high-level planthat will enable the government to realiseits e-Government vision and attain aposition of leadership in e-Governance by2010. This is in the light of the recentlyapproved National e-Governance ActionPlan (NeGP) for implementation duringthe year 2003-2007.

R. Chandrashekhar, AdditionalSecretary, DIT (GoI), outlined 10 goals ofe-Government in India. These includegovernment information and servicesthat can be delivered electronically areavailable through this mode for all highvolume areas (say any service thatinvolves more than 1,000 transactions ayear); broadband access available inevery village through OFC / wireless;community access points (assisted access)for all electronic services (governmentand private) are available in every villageor at most, in the adjoining village; allservices are available in the locallanguage; call centers that can be accessedfrom any mobile telephone that provideinformation/ services 24/7; everyindividual in the country has a unique IDthat is easily verifiable including biometricdata; high quality digital educationalcontent in regional languages accessiblein all villages; reach of Health servicesextended to villages through use of theICT platform; products and services ofrural India have access to global markets;and, all rural residents have access todomestic and international telecommu-ting based employment opportunities.

Today, most government depart-ments in India work as silos and when it

comes to computerisation and servicedelivery, there is lot of duplication ofefforts. States or departments begin fromscratch every time to develop their ownapplications, learning very less fromother’s experiences. There is a majorcommunication failure and lack ofexperience and knowledge sharingamong different states and depart-ments. Therefore the foremost questionis how to break the silos and movetowards standards and common pro-cesses so that the rollout of e-Gov-ernment projects are faster and efficient.The focus at this juncture should be to seehow not to re-invent the wheel. This wasthe objective of the second plenary paneldiscussion. Another panel discussion wason how to harness Public-PrivatePartnerships. Besides, eminent speakersfrom government, industry and NGOsfrom India and abroad discussed anddeliberated on issues such as: India’s e-Government Journey: Way ahead, Public-private partnerships in e-Government, e-Government in Municipalities, Standardsand Interoperability, Central MissionMode Projects and State initiatives ine-Governance, International Perspectivesin e-Government, e-Procurement,Security and e-Government, Capacitybuilding and e-Health. Their views andpers-pectives provided a great learningexperience to the participants. Some ofthe key points that emerged out of thevarious sessions are summed up asfollows:1. Key success factors of the National

e-Governance Programme (NeGP)of India are shared vision and goalsin the ecosystem, right institutionalframework, time bound, measurableaction plans, regular progress reportsin the public domain, committedpartnership with the private sectorand so forth.

2. Security policy should be in place andend-to-end connectivity needs to beensured for optimum utilization ofthe state wide area network(SWAN).

3. The National Mission Mode Projecton e-Governance in Municipalitiesfocusing on clearly identified citizenservices with clearly laid downservice levels and outcomes,improves efficiency and effectiveness

in interaction between localgovernment and its citizens and otherstakeholders.

4. The status of e-Passport project of theCentral Mission Mode Project of theMinistry of External Affairs,Government of India as of August2006 is: Out of 26 large missions 15has been completed and theremaining would be completed bythe end of March 2007.

5. The implementation issues in e-Passports are- electronicpersonalization, (inserting the chipinto the blank passport, encoding thechip with personal information) andreading the chip at border controlpoints.

6. e-Procurement has the benefits ofgreater transparency, reducedprocess cycle-time, reduce costs,improved image and instantavailability of real time information

7. There is need to increase awarenessabout e-Government standards withend users. At the same time,standards need to be defined at acentral level with mandatory andoptimal components.

8. Growth in Indian IT proficiency holdsthe potential to cater to the long-feltneeds of the public healthcare. In thisrega-rd, GIS and telemedicine arevital tools for e-Health care.

9. e-Gov networks are prone to highlevels of attack- from within andoutside and therefore there is a needto have a comprehensive plan tomitigate the threats. Network shouldbe built with self-defending productswith embedded protection.Through the exhibition, the confere-

nce provided an opportunity for updatingon new advancements, solutions andservices in the field of e-Governance. Theevent had different exhibitors from thegovernment and industry, who show-cased a wide range of products, servicesand initiatives in the domain of e-Government. These included Adobe,Canon, HP, Intel, Nortel, SAP, Wipro,Telelogic, Wipro, Government of Delhiand Jharkhand, among others. Therewere two workshops (viz., UN SolutionExchange Workshop on KnowledgeManagement and Moving out of the “PilotSyndrome” organised by UNDP and


NISG) that provided an opportunity fordelegates to interact and share with eachother their viewpoints and experiencesin various aspects of e-Government.

The conference concluded with thevaledictory session, chaired by CSDMSDirector, Ravi Gupta and co-chaired byM P Narayanan, President, CSDMS. Thepanelists included Adrian Marti, DeputyCountry Head, Swiss Agency forDevelopment and Cooperation(SDC), Piti Premotedham, ManagingDirector, Asia South, ComputerAssociates, Subhash C Khuntia, JointSecretary, Ministry of Human ResourceDevelop-ment, GoI. There was aninteractive discussion on the conferenceoutputs among the participants andpanelists.

During the concluding stage of theconference, the recommendations putforth by delegates for the government to

take note of and include it while planninge-Government projects. The recommen-dations are as follows: There should be amove towards joined-up government,and executives (CEOs) be maderesponsible for ensuring horizontal andvertical integration; Incubate anddocument best practices and criticalsuccess factors for projects. It should be acollective effort of government andprivate sector; Active involvement of thecivil society is a must; Organisations foroutreach of services to the citizens andcontent development; All services bemade available in local languages; 80% ofneeds for rural citizens pertain to health,education and agriculture, which needsto be addressed primarily throughCommon Service Centres; Need for anational policy on Standards; Quantitativeassessment of e-Government projects andoutcomes is required; Adopt Enterprise

Architecture as a process; Use of e-Formsshould be made mandatory; There is aneed to engage engineering and computerscience students in e-Governmentprojects and communicate to them aboutstandards; Need to have a comprehensiveplan against security threats; and, Establishwhole-of-government IT Portfoliomanagement.

The delegates unanimously laudedthe organising of the conference. Adelegate from Nepal said, “I congratulatefor the superb egov India 2006Conference. The conference was wellthought-out and coordinated. I have beendedicating my time on e-Governmentfor more than four years and have readmany journals related to the subject. Ithink I have gained more practicalinformation from this conference than inthe last four years of my academicinvestigation.”

Organisers Co-organisers State partners

knowledge for change

ovL CATION

Media partners

Department of Information

Technology

Government of India

U N

D P

Supporting partners

Dinner co-sponsors V-SAT partner Banking services Registration Schoolpartner counter sponsor network partner

Learning partner Gold sponsors Silver sponsor

23-25 August 2006Hotel Taj Palace, New Delhi

Post Conference Report

www.digitalLEARNING.in/DLIndia

2 Digital Learning India 2006 Conference Report

Digital Learning India 2006

Digital Learning India 2006 Conference Report 3

Building Community of Practitioners in ICT in EducationThe Digital Learning India 2006conference and Exhibition was held inconjunction with egov India 2006and Indian Telecentre Forum, from23-25 August at Hotel Taj Place, NewDelhi India. Organised by the Centrefor Science, Development and MediaStudies (CSDMS), India, the three-day events saw over 350 speakersand over 700 participants includingkey decision-makers fromgovernment, industry leaders,practitioners and academicians fromIndia and abroad.

The triple conferences and exhibitionwere co-organised by Ministry ofCommunication and InformationTechnology, Government of India andUNDP. Several national andinternational organisations like SDC,UNESCO, USAID, GeSCI, SIDA,Telecentre.org, Bellanet, SEAMEOand others supported the conference.Several corporate leaders,international organisations andgovernment departments wererepresented both in the programmeand at the exhibition space.

The Digital Learning India 2006conference aimed to take stock of theprogress made by India in usingtechnologies as the enabler ofeducation. The conference had alsoaimed to deliberate on the enablinginfrastructure and policies andchallenges of resources, and identifythe critical success factors that buildand sustain initiatives in ICT ineducation.

Digital Learning India 2006

The inauguration was graced byJainder Singh, Secretary,Department of IT, Government ofIndia, Dr Maxine Olson, UNDPResident Representative and UNResident Coordinator to India, M SSwaminathan, Chairmam, MSSwaminathan Research Foundation(MSSRF), Kiran Karnik, President,NASSCOM, Kraisorn Pornsutee,Permanent Secretary, Ministry ofInformation and CommunicationTechnology, Royal Thai Governmentand Dr M P Narayanan, President,CSDMS.

The Digital Learning India 2006conference, included focussed paneldiscussions, workshops andsessions providing an uniqueopportunity for participants toshare knowledge, informationnews, views and network with peersand experts from the country as wellas with other internationalstakeholders.

The main conference agenda wasformulated with guidance from theConference Advisory Board includedexperts and decision-makers fromaround the world. The conferenceincluded two plenary andfourteen parallel sessions spreadover three days. The conferenceagenda covered all the key areasaddressing the key concerns ofICT in education indeveloping countries anddeliberated on strategies foreffective integration.Inauguration of the event with lighting of the lamp

M V Rajashekharan, Minister of State for Planning, GoI, DrM P Narayanan, President, CSDMS

S C Khuntia, Joint Secretary, MHRD, GoI R Chandrashekhar, Addl. Secretary, MCIT, GoI, DorothyGordon, Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in IT, KiranKarnik, NASSCOM

Integrating technologies ineducation involves comprehensiveand coherent frameworks, policiesand processes, which candetermine why and how technologyshould be utilised in education.While India has moved ahead ofmany of its Asian neighbours in itsIT workforce, the basic issues ofquality, equity and access toeducation still remain unresolved.Where technology has succeededin influencing the educationoutreach and quality, supportingprocesses and frameworks thatcan sustain such efforts have notemerged. A lack of adequateknowledge sharing among keystakeholders and community ofpractitioners has also delayed theprocess of using technologies asenablers of learning. Rumi Mallickand Manjushree Reddy of DigitalLearning India 2006 conferencetakes stock of ICT in Education inIndia.


The first Plenary session of the daywas on ‘International perspectives inICT in Education’. The session aimedat understanding the activities ofleading international organisations inbridging the digital divide ineducation. This session, which waschaired by Keshav Desiraju, JointSecretary of the Ministry of HumanResource Development, Governmentof India, saw five key speakersfrom Thailand, India, Ghana andHong Kong.

Dr Edilberto de Jesus, Director,SEAMEO Secretariat, Thailandexplained that the SEAMEO or theSouth-east Asian Ministers’ ofEducation Organisation, works at theregional level between twelvecountries in Asia to carry outspecialized research and training inareas of education, agriculture, health,and innovations. He explained thatSEAMEO centres use ICTs to shareand disseminate knowledge topromote regional cooperation andnetwork building in research andeducation. Dorothy K Gordon,Founder-Director General , KofiAnnan Centre for Excellence in IT,Ghana, insisted that whileexperimenting with new media, it is

necessary to work in a team witheducators, with psychologists, withthe whole range of people, especiallyfor developing the right pedagogyfor using new media ineducation and capacity building.She elaborated from her workat the Kofi Annan Centre whichfocuses on capacity building ofIT professionals.

Minja Yang, Director andRepresentative, UNESCO-Indiaexplained the focus of work ofUNESCO in India, in mainstreamingradio as a means of education and istrying to fill the missing link betweenteachers, students and the parents interms of the kind of research andlearning tools available for each.UNESCO is collaborating withorganisations like National Centre forEducation Research and Training(NCERT), NEIPA and NationalInstitute on Open Schooling (NIOS) inIndia to develop education kits, life-kits for school students and teachersand also reach out to the neo literatesand even those who are out of school.Yin Cheong CHENG, Director, Asia-Pacific Educational ResearchAssociation (APERA), Hong KongInstitute of Education, in his

“The issue of concernis not digital divide,but the education

divide, because manyof these (Asian)

countries still face the problem of reaching the‘education for all’ target and the Millennium

Development Goals. For some years now, issueshave been under intense discussion. What we

are also looking at is the ‘massification’ of highereducation, i.e how to make higher education

more accessible and affordable for the masses.Although the issue of ‘massification’ of higher

education is driven by many forces indeveloping countries, using of ICTs, say for

distance education can be one very importantway to make higher education opportunities

available and affordable to the masses. ”

“We need research.We cannot make

assumption on whatworks best when weare using new media.

The problem is innovation really requiresinnovative people to create it...all of us are

victims of an education system, whichemphasises our ability to assimilate facts and

then exaggerate these facts as key points in oureducational career. …In an US lecture I was

told that after 30 years of teaching computerscience, the only research that has been

conclusive in terms of how you create an ITprofessional or a computer science garaduate is

that you have to encourage peer learningand people have to work in teams to have

more effectivity.”

“I’m amazed by thenumber of ICT

related conferencesbeing organized inIndia. This justifies

the related significance of ICTs. For e-Learning,learning is the critical issue, ‘e’ is the modality.

Because we are more enthusiastic about e, weare putting it before learning. UNESCO isinstrumental in availing the digital learningopportunities to reach the un-reached in

education and learning.”

Dr Edilberto de Jesus,Director, SEAMEO

Secretariat, Thailand

Dorothy Gordon,Founder-DirectorGeneral, Kofi AnnanCentre for Excellencein IT, Ghana

Minja Yang, Directorand Representative,UNESCO-India

Learning from international experience, exploring theneed for ICT in Education policy, understanding thetechnology and learning perspective... Day One

(From left to right): Dorothy Gordon, Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in IT, Dr Edilberto de Jesus, SEAMEO,Keshav Desiraju (Chairperson), MHRD, GoI, Minja Yang, Unesco-India, Yin Cheong CHENG, APERA, Col. K J Singh,Designmate


Keshav Desiraju, Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment, Government of India

“I’m never tired of saying it especially in forums like this- we are acountry of huge divides. Most important is that we need to see to it

that in our endeavours we do not end up in a situation wheretechnology application in general or the ICT in particular, worsens isthe divide. When people talk about ICTs, it should not be somethingthat is of use in fancy schools. Working with the Ministry of HRD we

are concerned primarily with government schools-schools that dependon public money, whose teachers are paid from public fund. That really is the challenge-to explore

ICTs for government schools… the ultimate goal is the free exchange of knowledge. Anything thatcan facilitate free exchange of knowledge, anything that makes this process easier and more useful,

anything which enables that process of teaching to be long-lasting is clearly what we need towork on. But let’s not forget that this is a tool like any other.”

presentation titled ‘Paradigm Shifts inLearning & Integration of ICT inEducation’ explained the three majorconcerns in Educational Reform-effectiveness in teaching andlearning, quality of education to meetthe multiple and diverse needs in thesociety, and relevance to the future inan era of IT and globalization. CHENGelaborated an unique concept of‘triplization’ of learning thatcomprises of globalisation,localisation, and individualisation.Col K J Singh, of Designmate,India, a leading producer of digitalcontent for schools outlined somemajor challenges of ICT-enablededucation in India namelyinfrastructure, connectivity,accessibility, localisation of content.Col Singh elaborated how effectivemultimedia content that ispedagogically linked can revolunalisethe education process and classroomlearning in schools.

Keshav Desiraju, Joint Secretary,Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment, Government of Indiaexplained that the most importantconsideration is numbers, whether itis a matter of pedagogy, contenttechnology application, everythinghas to be looked at in a huge scale.There are huge number of childrenwho remain out of school, thepotential of ICTs has to be explored inreaching out to these out-of-schoolstudents, who do not have any fixedtime to study but are still veryvaluable resources of this country.Drawing from what the four speakers

have discussed, Desiraju pointed outthat for developing countries andespecially India, ‘massification’ -bringing services and opportunity tothe masses, pedagogicallyaligned content that addressesthe diversity of users and learners,

and the seamless movement fromupwards from relevance toeffectiveness to quality in educationare critical issues that need tobe addressed.

The session on ‘e-Learning : TheTechnology and Learningperspective’ was chaired by Dr GNarendra Kumar, IT Secretary,Government of National CapitalTerritory of Delhi. GauravBhatnagar, Senior Vice President,Educomp India introduced‘Mathsguru’ that helps students withtheir maths problems. The

development systems allows teachersto write and explain and also recordand compress files. Ashish Duggal,Director Marketing, GilatNetworking Systems explained thepotential and importance of VSATnetworks in rural and remote areas.M G Bala Prasanna, ProjectManager, Centre for GoodGovernance, explained a performancemonitoring system - ‘School ScoreCard’ that uses five parametres toanalyse the school performancenamely enrollment ratio, pupilattendance, performance of students,availability of teachers, infrastructurefacilities. Victor Lyon of Tara Aksharshared his experience in ICT-enabledliteracy programme in rural areas.

The panel discussion on ‘Frameworkfor ICT in education policy’ was ledby the Global eSchools andCommunities Initiative (GeSCI),Dublin. This session was chaired bySubhash C Khuntia, Joint Secretary,Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment, Government of India.Dr Ashish Garg, India Coordinator,GeSCI, moderated the session. Theaim of this session was to deliberateon the systematic approachesrequired, the efficacy of a policy tosystemically integrate ICTs ineducation and the components ofsuch a policy. Dr Patti Swarts,Education Strategist, GeSCI in herpresentation deliberated on the needfor an ICT in Education policy.

(From left to right): M G Bala Prasanna, CGG, India, Ashish Duggal, Gilat, Dr G Narendra Kumar (Chairperson),Government of NCT, India, Gaurav Bhatnagar, Educomp and Victor Lyon, Tara Akshar


Dr Swarts explained that GeSCI is anUNICT taskforce foundedorganisation and its vision to catalysepartner and support with national andregional e-schools initiatives. Whilesetting the stage for the need for ICTin education policy, she pointed outthat there is a non-focus oneducation objectives while speakingon ICT in education and a lack of acomprehensive system that considersall the elements of end-to-end systemi.e. a comprehensive approach.

Alfred Ilukena, Under Secretary,Formal Education, Ministry ofEducation, Government of Namibiashared how Namibia drafted itsmost successful ICT in educationpolicy and developed theframework for implementation.Stating the case for Namibia,Ilukena pointed out that if the goalswere clearly identified theneverything that was to be done in theimplementation process of ICTs willhave to be benchmarked againstthese goals with the governmentplaying the role of the facilitator,providing leadership and guidance,and controlling the quality.

While Dr K K Gupta, Joint Director-IT, Dept of Education, Government ofRajasthan shared his experience onthe Rajasthan Education Initiative(REI) and its path breaking work inmobilising public-privatepartnership to improve educationthrough use of ICTs,VivekBharadwaj, Director, Ministry ofHuman Resource Development,Government of India, one of the keyplanners of the ‘ICT in school’programme of the Ministry,

explained that the government realisesthat there is more to educationtechnology than just computers.However a policy is required to helpus determine options, otherwise thereis confusion.

Subhash Khuntia, Joint Secretary,Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment, Government of India,who chaired the session pointed outthat although India does not have adocument as “Policy on ICT ineducation”, it is not working in apolicy vacuum; there are severaldocuments, be it the educationpolicy or the IT policy, where ICTsfor education has been has talked of.The joint secretary, drawingexamples from the ‘ICT in school’programme, emphasised that thecountry is moving in the rightdirection in ICT in education. Sincethe numbers are large- schools andstudents wise, it will take some timebefore adequate systems are builtand a clear policy emerges.However, whatever policy isframed or emerges, it has to beflexible and dynamic enough toincorporate the changes thatwould be deemed necessary fromtime to time.

“What is the end-to-end system that I’vebeen talking about?It encompasseslooking at theeducational

objectives which should drive the technologyintegration into the education system, itencompasses the key players, the key actors andit looks at what resources are needed, thefunding. All of these together need to giveconsideration to the deployment of ICTplatform…. One need to go back and reviewthe system to see whether the methodologieswould be appropriate for the newtechnologies...”

“In a policy andimplementationplan…we might needto look at availingwireless facilities, or to resolve the powerproblem by putting the solar panels in order tobring technology to that area. But we also needto look at the curriculum development as acritical component, then content development,school management …issue of maintenance…the maintenance policy and technical supporthas to be very clear… a breakdown ofmaintenance leads to frustration whichbecomes a hindrance... so the monitoring andevaluation mechanisms are developed tomonitor the whole mechanism that isdeveloped.”

“Educationtechnology in thepolicy (India) already

has a separate section; what is needed now is tomake a comprehensive policy. The governmentbelieves in one policy document in education, tohave a holistic approach and not fragmentedinto health education, population education, etc.So its time now for the civil society and thegovernment to come together and set up aworking group, study the policy initiatives indifferent countries, prepare the draft, discussand then come to a conclusion.”

Dr Patti Swarts,Education Strategist,GeSCI

Alfred Ilukena,Under Secretary,Formal Education,Ministry of Education,Government ofNamibia

Vivek BharadwajDirector, Ministry ofHuman ResourceDevelopment,Government of India

Subhash Khuntia,Joint Secretary,Ministry of HumanResourceDevelopment,Government of India

“The (ICT inEducation) policydocument needs to

be dynamic, should constantly keep onchanging and if it’s a new sector, the frequencyof change could be more. At the same time, itmust provide a direction and guideline forvarious components in the sector. It shouldaddress the inequities in the system, the digitaldivide that exists, between the rich and poor,educated and uneducated, urban and rural.That is why the policy document should evolvethrough a consultative process in varioussectors in the government and also in civilsociety, and both public and private sectorsneed to be involved. Prioritisation is something,which is very necessary in a policy document, asthese are tied with limitations like financialavailabilities.”

Dr Ashish GargIndia Coordinator,GeSCI


Second day of the conference sawtwo sessions running parallelly -‘Integrating technology intoeducation-Digital Equaliser way’ ledby American India Foundation (AIF)and ‘ICT for children’ led by PlanInternational .

In the session , IntegratingTechnology into Education-DigitalEqualiser way’ ShankarVenketeswaran, Executive Director,Chetan Kapoor and Sunder Krishnan,of AIF outlined the activities of AIF,which focuses on technologyintegration in underserved schoolsand empower, teachers to add value toquality teaching. Dr Isher JudgeAhluwaia, Vice-Chairperson,Planning Board, Punjab and Member,National ManufacturingCompetitiveness Council,Government of India who presentedthe keynote in this session pointed outthat ICT in education is placing thetechnology in reformed educationsystem where government, the parent,the teacher and the student have towork together to bring this reform.

The session also saw a discussionbetween teachers and students fromGovernment Railway school inHyderabad and Akshya PratishthanSchool Delhi. Conducted by AnnieKoshi, Principal, St Mary’s school,Delhi, this interaction saw studentssharing their views on whethercomputers have brought any changeinto their learning, and if computereducation has helped the girlsbecome more confident. The sessionsaw an intense discussion on theteachers’ approach to teaching and totechnology. The general line ofthought was that computers servebest in teaching science and maths,social studies like geography, etc.However teachers need to be self-motivated and take a leadership inusing ICTs for education.

The panel discussion (alsoled by AIF) on‘Technology in Schools-Building Partnerships forSuccess’ discussed anddebated the components

and the processes of a successfulpartnership for ICT in education.

For Prof Dr Poonam Batra, CentralInstitute of Education, DelhiUniversity, ICTs, to become a bridgebetween quantity and quality,teachers, parents and schools, haveto work as partners and make theschool a learning organisation.Ashutosh Chadda, Manager-Education, Intel, India pointed outthat successful partnership has to bebuilt around a vision to providephysical infrastructure likeclassrooms, people and processes,the curriculum and the content. KChandramouli, State ProjectDirector, Andhra Pradesh, shared hisstate’s experience in initiatingcomputers in1000 school inpartnership with IBM, ByrrajuFoundation, Reddy Foundation,Nandi Foundation, Microsoft. JShankar, Azim Premji Foundation,India emphasised that there should bea high level of interest amongst thepartners and the partners have tobelieve in a common goal. He alsopointed out that for a partnership tosucceed, the partners must have afirst hand experience of implementingprojects and a clear strategy to dealwith changes in governmentleadership. Manas Chakravorty, Head,Hole-in-the-wall-limited (HIWEL),moderated this session andsummarised that partnerships withcommunity are important for effectiveimplementation and sustainability ofan initiative.

This session also saw the Launch of apartnership between AIF andNASSCOM Foundation-through theMember Connect programme. KiranKarnik, Trustee and President,NASSCOM elaborated thepartnership and Rufina Fernandes,CEO, NASSCOM Foundationmoderated the launch ceremony.

“This conference isabout going deeperdown into thebuilding blocks ofwhat gives us thehuman capital,

what gives us the skills with which we cantake on not just global competition but alsobuild our own economy and society… Wereally need to bring the whole systemtogether to see if we want education to bemore relevant, to be more interesting andcontemporary.”

“Buildingpartnership is agreat art andsustaining it andtaking it to the

logical end with a thumping success is reallyimportant... today we are proud, all keyprivate sector leaders are coming forward toto partner with us. “

Dr Isher JudgeAhluwaliaVice-Chairperson,Planning Board, Punjab

K ChandramouliState Project Director,Andhra Pradesh, India

(From left to right): J Shankar, Azim Premji Foundation, KChandramouli, SSA, Andhra Pradesh, Manas Chakravorty(Chairperson), Hiwel, Ashutosh Chadda, Intel and Dr PoonamBatra, Delhi University

Student Kiran Karnik, President NASSCOM

Partnerships for technologies in schools, integrating e-Learning in classrooms, ICT for rural children, Governmentefforts under ‘education for all’ and integrating process,technology and capacity building... Day Two


The session on ‘ICT for children’ wasled by Plan International. The aim ofthe session was to deliberate on theeducation technology options forrural areas and to develop a commonunderstanding on potentials that ICThas for rural children. Randeep Kaurof Plan International moderated thissession. Douglas Bell, EducationAdvisor, Education DevelopmentCentre (EDC) shared his experience inthe programme ‘Technology Tools forTeachers and Training’ (T4). Hepointed out that high qualitypedagogy is at the centre of theprogramme. Karnaram Punar, from

Urmul, a trust actively working in 110villages across Western Rajasthanshared his experience in promotingwriting skills and knowledge of ICTsamong youths. The discussion thatfollowed the presentation primarilyfocussed on the role of localgovernment and local communityparticipation in such initiatives.

The second part of the paneldiscussion on ICT in education sawPriti Patil, Centre for Development ofAdvanced Computing (CDAC),Mumbai, Sajan Venniyoor fromPrasar Bharti, Douglas Bell, EDCand Vivek Bharadwaj from theMinistry of Human Resourcedevelopment, Government of India andDr Nilay Ranjan from One WorldSouth Asia. Priti Patil talked about

how open source powers locallanguage computing for children.Child becomes conceptually soundwhen he/she acquires knowledgethrough her/his mother tongue. Thediscussion in this session focussedaround the various technologyoptions available from satellite TV tocommunity radio and programmes thathelp to develop life-skills of children.It emerged from the discussion thatalthough immense opportunities existin using commu-nity radio foreducation, absence of a policy on acommunity radio and restriction onthe use of frequency by the

community (other than research andeducation institutions) has hamperedthe use of this technology foreducation in rural areas.

The session on ‘Governmentsupported initiatives in ICT foreducation’ was chaired by Dr KSubramaniam, Deputy DirectorGeneral of National InformaticsCentre (NIC), Government of India.Dr Puranchand of National Instituteof Open Schooling (NIOS)empasised that both formal and openeducation systems are required tomeet the challenges. O N Singh,Commissioner, Navodaya VidyalayaSamiti (NVS), a network of over 500schools spread across India sharedhis experience in implementingcomputer-aided learning in the

schools across the country. Singhalso explained the network’s plan forenabling smart schools in every statein India. Meena Bhatt, State ProjectDirector of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan(National initiative for Education forall), Gujarat, shared the state’sexperience in computer-aided-learning(CAL) in schools. The programmedeveloped under ‘Build Own Operateand Transfer’ (BOOT) model, hademphasised on teacher training, andcapacity building and contentdevelopment in the local language.K J Lohe, State Project Director ofSarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Nagaland,

pointed out the biggest concerns forthe state in implementing ICT-enablededucation is the lack of reliable andlocal language multimedia content andmotivation and training amongteachers to sustain a programme.Dr Edilberto de Jesus, Director,SEAMEO, who co-chaired thissession reiterated that integratingICTs to the existing curriculum is themost challenging task.

Dr K Subramanium, while summa-rising the session recommended thatlearning materials needs to be deve-loped keeping in view its absorptionby different skill level, creating oflocal language content through locallevel participation and multipledelivery channels are good ways tomake the education for all a reality.

(From left to right): Douglas Bell, EDC, Sajan Venniyoor, Prasar Bharti, Randeep Kaur, Plan International, Dr NilayRanjan, One World South Asia, Priti Patil, CDAC and Vivek Bhardwaj, MHRD, GoI

Randeep Kaur, Plan Intl. Chetan Kapoor, AIF

Sunder Krishnan, AIF Karnaram Punar, Urmul


between traditional forms ofpresentation of contents and curriculaand the new generation of technologyreaching 165,000 classrooms in 2006.

Tess Camba, Director, Commissionon Information and CommunicationsTechnology, Philippines, who sharedthe ‘ischool’ initiative experience ofpartnership between government,private and non-governmentorganisations. The process focussedon community mobilisation, trainingof teachers, deployment of equipment,and content development. Dr Zahid HKhan, Hony. Director, Centre forInformation Technology, Jamia MiliaUniversity, explained the process of‘Web-based Urdu Learning ThroughHindi Medium’, which is the onlycourse of this kind available in thecountry. The University’s next aim isto develop an Urdu Learningprogramme using rich multimedia thatis accessible to all. This session waschaired by K J Singh, Director,Designmate. The discussion in thissession primarily centred around theteachers response in the process ofinducting ICT in education andtaking on the ICT way of teaching.The panellists pointed out thatthe awareness level and familiarisationof teachers to computers wascrucial before they adopted thetechnology. K J Singh referred toKiran Karnik’s remarks on the first dayfor the education sector–‘Weare still stuck to the video filmingmode’ and have not been able tobring the latest techniques whichare available.

The panel discussion on ‘Challengesand opportunities of technologyintegration in classrooms’ was led byEducomp India. The panel discussionsaw a balanced representation fromthe key stakeholders of ICT ineducation, funding organisation,digital content provider, experts whotrain teachers and educators,academician and school administrator.The panellists included ManishaSolanki, Development Advisor,European Commission, India,Abhinav Dhar, Sr Vice President atEducomp India, Kalpana Kapoor,Principal, Delhi Public School, India,Indrajit Bhattacharya- AdditionalDirector, DOEACC Society,Dr Morten Falch of the DanishTechnological University, SatyajitSingh, Platform Solutions Managerfor South East Asia, EmergingMarket and Platform Group of Intel.The panellist summarised thatdigital multimedia content inclassrooms, if coupled with traditionaltools used by teachers for teaching inschools, can lead to 100% utilisationof the brain capacity of learners;teachers plays a crucial role ine-Learning even if the focus islearner-centered learning; teachersrole need to be well defined withrespect to new pedagogy; blendedlearning model of e-learning with afocus on experience- based learning iseffective for teachers training as wellas adoption of e-learning in schools;the measure for technology utilisationin classroom should be howtechnology is being used –focusingon commitment, leadership, planning,

and processes, and not just thefrequency of use; alternativetechnologies like cell phone, MP3, etc.also need to be explored forclassroom learning.

The session on ‘Framework ofProcess, Technology, CapacityBuilding’ for effective ICT ineducation interventions saw, FlorHurtado , Instituto Latinoamericanode la Comunicación Educativa (ILCE),Mexico explaining the Enciclomediaabout project that had aimed toestablish a natural connection

Meena Bhatt, State Project Director, Sarva ShikshaAbhiyan, Gujarat, India

O N Singh, Commissioner, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti,India

K J Lohe, State Project Director, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan,Nagaland, India

(From left to right): Anil Jaggi, NIOS, Srikant Iyer, Edurite, Sonjib Mukherjee (Chairperson), Metalearn,Uday Singh Pawar, Microsoft Research, India and Vivek Agarwal, Liqvid

Flor HurtadoInstitutoLatinoamericanode la Communi-cacion Educativa(ILCE), Mexico

Dr Morten FalchDanishTechnologicalUniversity,Denmark

Tess CambaDirector,Commissionon Infor-mation andCommunicationsTechnology,Philippines

Abhinav DharEducompIndia


The second part ofthis sessionwas chaired bySonjib Mukherjee,CEO, Metalearn,one of the leadingcontent providers inthe country. VivekAgarwal, CEO, Liqvid, explained hisorganisation’s initiatives in teachingenglish to student. Uday Singh Pawar,Researcher, Microsoft ResearchIndia demonstrated MicrosoftResearch’s innovation on ‘MultipleMice’ where a single computer can beused by several students with severalmice thus enhancing students’engagement and productivity of acomputer. Srikanth B Iyer, President& COO, Edurite, emphasised thatcreativity in content is important andEdutite is focusing on bottom-updevelopment of content - fromsyllabus focussed on top-down re-arrangement to fit different syllabi.Anil Jaggi, ICT Consultant, NationalSchool of Open Schooling (NIOS),India, explained the process of ‘Ondemand examination system’ of theNIOS, an online examination systemwhich allows students to takeexaminations at their own pace andtime. The twin session indicated thatalthough there was a felt need for acomprehensive framework thatincorporated technology integrationrelevent education content andcapacity building of educators forICT-enabled learning, there was still alack of clarity on what shouldconstitute this framework andpractitioners still focussed onaddressing issues component bycomponent.

The first session of the third daytitled ‘Leadership reflection in ICTintegration in education, technology,content and capacity building’ wasaimed at hearing from the marketleaders on how their efforts andproducts have served the ICT ineducation sector and their viewpointson what works best for ICT ineducation. This session was chairedby Dorothy Gordon of Kofi AnnanCentre for Excellence in IT, Ghana.Nancy Knowlton, President and co-CEO, SMART Technologies sharedher experience in facilitating the useof SMART’s interactive whiteboard inschools and education institutions.For Knowlton, the key to successfulintegration of ICT in education is tofocus on leadership at the state,district and the school levels.Teachers need to be selected to

Leadership reflection in ICT integration in education, opentechnologies and resources for India; public private partnership

for education; government perspective on ICT’s for educationand measurement and evaluation of e-Learning; localisation; and

large scale take up of e-Learning... Day Three

“…Chooseproducts that areboth easy to startusing and growswith a teacher’sskills. Ensure

technology is always up and running, involvethe students with assistance of the teacher.The product impacts on improving studentengagement, improving motivation andattendance, supports different learning styles,improves review and retention, streamlineteacher preparation”.

“It is the teacher inthe classroom wholays down the rules.So any content,which is meant tobe inside theclassroom, has tofirst speak to theteacher; it must meet the teachers’ needs fordelivering better education outcomes”.

Nancy KnowltonPresident andco-CEO, SMART

Shantanu PrakashCEO, Educomp, India

champion adoption and digitalresources availability have to beassured. Shantanu Prakash, CEO,Educomp, one of the largest digitalcontent producers of India pointedout that any learning contentproduced for the classroom has tomeet the requirements of the teachersfor delivering better education.

Capt KJS Brar, CEO, Designmate,one of the leading educationalmultimedia content producers of India,explained that the effectiveness of anyanimation is when it engages thestudents and makes learning interes-ting and joyful. Prabish Chandran,Director, Vidyatech has been invol-ved in designing of instruction solu-tions using 3D games, game engines,etc. For Chandran an ideal contentdevelopment strategy is when contentis kept separate from technology.

Dr Edilberto de Jesus of SEAMEOchaired the session on ‘Governmentperspectives on ICT in education’.Dr K Subramanium, Deputy DirectorGeneral, National Informatic Centre(NIC), India explained the challengesand opportunities in educationservices under the GATT scenario.Dr Sashibhushan of Indira GandhiNational Open University (IGNOU)pointed out the challenges ofinadequate bandwidth availability for

A session in progress Session in an interactive and participatory mode


delivery of online and distanceeducation programmes. L K Atheeq,State Project Director, SarvaShiksha Abhiyan, Karnataka, sharedthe issues and challenges ofproviding computer education andintegrating ICT in primary schools,especially in rural areas. Dr Edilbertosummarised and emphasised thatIndia should invest in researching thepedagogy for ICT for education. Healso expressed that, India needs toresolve its points of tensions;between technology and infrastruc-ture; between what India sees as itsnational needs and the internationalopportunities; and between ICTeducation and ICT for education.

The aim of the session on ‘OpenTechnologies in Education in India’.was to understand MIT opencourseware initiative and deliberate

on the potential and challenges ofinitiating it in India. Vijay Kumar,Assistant Provost, MIT, USA, who isalso an advisor to the NationalKnowledge Commission of India,explained that For Prof Vijay Kumar,quality of open content, and creatingquality enabled facilities arenecessary for a very robust blendededucation model. The open contentresources (OCW) of MIT have a verycritical role to play for education inIndia. He elaborated the OCWcomponents and also explained theiLabs initiative which provides accessto virtual laboratories over theInternet and the Open KnowledgeInitiative (OKI), which is a serviceoriented architecture that supportsdevelopment of application, withouthaving to create a core architectureevery time. Prof Phillip Long of MIT,introduced the iCampus initiative in

collaboration with MicrosoftResearch. The initiative aims atfinding new educational tools foractive learning and web services as anunderlying infrastructure andcurrently Birla Institute ofTechnology, Pilani in India hasbecome one of these hubs. Prof Longalso explained and demonstratedother related initiatives of MIT.

The discussion by Prof Kumar andProf Long indicated that there isimmense potential of the various openlearning and technology initiativesMIT for higher education indeveloping countries. However, therewas a general lack of awarenessamong the institutions and studentsof about these various opportunitiesavailable. The discussion alsorevolved around how universities inIndia can initiate similar activities.

‘We want tobuild contents

that willcontinue even

with the changeof technology.

Contentmalleability is another goal- that is, how do

we ensure that what we build for onetechnology can be easily used on another

technology’.

Prabish ChandranDirector, Vidyatech

L K AtheeqState ProjectDirector, SarvaShiksha AbhiyanKarnataka

“The biggest challenge is to scale-up thepilots, motivate the teachers to continuesuch programmes and provide adequateICT infrastructure for schools.”

“at the National Knowledge Commission of Indiawe have been trying to show the valueproposition of network enabled open educationfor increasing access and quality ineducation…the aim is to make India a leader inglobal knowledge economy. In order to meet theseneeds of national development as well as to be a

key player, we really have to look at how we can provide quality. So theproblem which the Commission addresses is of scaling excellence”.

Prof Vijay KumarAssistant Provost,MassachusettsInstitute ofTechnology (MIT),USA

Prof Phillip LongMassachusettsInstitute ofTechnology (MIT),USA

Capt. K J S Brar, Designmate, India and DorothyGordon, Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in IT, Ghana

CSDMS publications at display

(From left to right); Dr K Subramaniam, NIC, Dr Shashi Bhushan, IGNOU, Dr Edilbertode Jesus, SEAMEO and L K Atheeq, SSA, Karnataka


While discussing the modalities ofsuch initiatives Prof Kumar alsocautioned the participants that qualityand global standards have to bemaintained if courses are to be putonline and virtual labs have to becreated. There was a generalconsensus that more effectivecollaborations are required to realizethe full potential of such initiatives.

The session on Public PrivatePartnerships for ICT in Educationwas led by QUEST. Aakash Sethi,Executive Director, QUEST Alliancein his overview elaborated thatQUEST- Quality Education and SkillsTraining Alliance is a partnership ofpublic, private and non-governmentalorganizations working together tocreate, pilot and institutionalisetechnology tools for improving thequality of education at all levels inboth formal and non-formal settings.The International Youth Foundation(which is funded by USIAD) managesthe QUEST secretariat and brokersrelationships with all interestedparties inside and outside theAlliance. Ujwal Thakkar, CEO,Pratham, a leading NGO that works ineducation, explained that the primaryobjective of such partnerships were toget skills and funding for critical newdiversification on the continuum ofthe value chain. Anshuman Varma of

the Community Affairs Team,Microsoft India described the‘Unlimited Potential program’ thatfocuses on improving lifelonglearning for underserved individualsby providing technology skills. NaliniGangadharan, Chairperson & TrusteeChild and Police (CAP) pointed outthat learning has to be linked withlivelihoods; and partnerships are thebest ways to grow and learn.

The discussion of the partnersindicated that the QUEST partnershipincludes implementation partnersprimarily NGOs who may use theQUEST platform to implement some oftheir innovative programmes, resourcepartners like Microsoft and Lucentwho use the platform to designprogramme and implement them andtechnical partners who providetechnical support and expertise inprogramme execution, implementation,design. Nalini Gangadharan said‘what brings us together in thisAlliance is that education technologyfor the most deprived’. Sethi informedthat as a part of the programme, aportal would be created which willserve as an information resourcecentre where all the experiments inICT in education will be documented,along with initiatives under QUEST,so that organisations can benefit fromthis knowledge.

Digital Learning Innovation 2006 Award

Digital Learning recognised theinnovative initiatives of thiscommunity, in realizing andunleashing the potentials of ICT, byintroducing the ‘Innovation 2006’Award. The Digital Learning

Innovation 2006 Award went toSeva Mandir in Udaipur,Rajasthan, India for theirinnovative ‘Camera SchoolProgramme’ to reduce teacherabsenteeism in schools. NeelimaKhetan, Chief Executive of SevaMandir received the Award fromMani Shankar Aiyar, UnionMinister of Panchayati Raj,Government of India.

Seva Mandir, a Non-GovernmentOrganization working in over 600villages of Udaipur and Rajsamanddistricts of Rajasthan, conceived theCamera school experiment in 2003with the help of Economists Esther

Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee, teachingat MIT and associated with thePoverty Action Lab, as a possiblesolution to reduce the teacherabsenteeism. Cameras were providedto single-teacher schools run by SevaMandir in Rajasthan’s Udaipurdistrict, and these cameras haveshown how to improve teacherattendance through direct monitoring.The tamper-proof cameras recordteacher attendance with the help ofentry and exit hour snaps of theteachers in the school with thestudents. This simple but innovativeuse of technology has provided a wayto reduce the critical problem ofteacher truancy in schools, therebytaking a step forward to theuniversalisation of education.

Madhu RanjanEducation Officer,USAID, India

“One does nothave to have acommon cause foran alliance towork, one has tohave a common

commitment. We are all for children andyouth accessing quality education for liveli-hood advancement. All of us bound by thatbut each one of us has our specific area offocus, each one of us has our own strengthsand that is the beauty of this alliance.”

Aakash SethiExecutive Director

QUEST

“The QUEST-alliance is lookingfor moreinterested peoplewho want toleverage theplatform and build partnership that ismutually beneficial.”

(From left to right); Doglas Bell, EDC, Anshuman Varma,Microsoft, Ujjawal Thakkar, Pratham, NaliniGangadharan, CAP and Akash Sethi, QUEST


The last plenary of the day was on‘Measurement and evaluation of e-Learning, localisation and largescale take-up of e-Learning’. Thepanel discussion included VivekBharadwaj, Director, Ministry ofHuman Resource Development,Manas Chakraborty, Head, HIWEL,Sunder Krishnan from AmericanIndia Foundation and was chaired bySubhas Khuntia, Joint Secretary,Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment. Vivek Bharadwaj sharedhis experience of working withUNESCO in developing indicators formeasurement of impacts of ICT ineducation. UNESCO has developedimpacts indicators such as inputindicators, process indicators andand output indictors. ForChakraborty, there are three issuesthat needs to be addresses in large-scale take-up of ICT-enablededucation- making relevant contentavailable, providing adequateinfrastructure and evaluating theoutcome of ICT integration. SunderKrishnan pointed out that evaluationmust remain focussed on measuringand monitoring the use of technologyto fulfill the program’s goals andevaluation tools should monitorprogress and performance in areaswhere obstacles are expected.Krishnan also pointed out that theselection of schools that are bestpositioned to benefit from ComputerAided Learning (CAL) may be themost critical factor determining thesuccess of the schools ICT program.

ICT programs have to be customiseddepending on the needs of eachschool and a continued focus onteachers’ professional developmentand a national digital trust for contentdevelopment are also crucial forsustainability of interventions.Subhas Khuntia pointed out thatthere is need of national evaluationstudy on utilisation of computers inschools. Scaling up is intimatelyrelated to measurement andevaluation. Process and technologyintegration evaluations help to re-think and re-align processes to makethem more effective.

Key recommendations for effectiveICT integration in education

A clear policy that is dynamic and inclusive, with budgetary priorities.This is required to systematically work towards redressing inequalitiesand inequities and provide a sound and sustainable strategy for ICT ineducationTo use ICTs for the achievement of ‘education-for-all’; ICTs needs to beexplored for the management of ‘ICT for all’ programme and improvingthe efficiency for the delivery of education servicesPartnerships are important medium for effective funding, implementation,and monitoring of programmesContinued focus on teachers’ professional development, pre-servicetraining and in-service training of teachers are neededTraining curriculum for teachers and educators have to be standadisedCollaborative research on the pedagogy of ICT-based learning must beinitiativesConnectivity has to be addressed as an issue, following the three basicissues of food, clothing and shelterNational guidelines for content development and standards andmechanisms for evaluating digital content for education neededA national clearing-house or a repository of digital learning resourceespecially content is recommendedNational digital trust for content development - a portal where all thestakeholders can exchange knowledge and views, problems andchallenges which can grow through effective peer-learningSensitisation of education officers, teachers and educators on ICT in educationResearch and identify indicators of impact assessment of ICT ineducation is very critical need of the present timeMonitoring and evaluation of interventions to be built-in in the processExploring open education resources, open technologies and collaborativeresearch in higher education as a policy and strategyPromoting and supporting open schooling and education for formaleducation, vocational education and life-skill education to bridge theknowledge divide

(From left to right); Vivek Bhardwaj, MHRD, Subhash Khuntia, MHRD, GoI, Manas Chakravorty, Hiwel andSunder Krishnan, American India Foundation


This is where showcasing was doneKey solution providers in ICT in Education participated in theExhibition. The exhibition was inaugurated by Jainder Singh, Secretary,Department of IT, Government of India. The exhibition served as ameeting point for the participants within the conference, and as anexcellent opportunity to meet with and be up-to-date with the latestofferings of the key exhibiting companies and institutions.

What our participants sayExcellent participation…many great speakers who had substance tooffer in terms of their knowledge and experience. Also excellentnetworking, linked to the general high quality of participation,good audience discussion in some sessions and opportunities forfollow-up.

Dorothy Gordon, Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in IT, Ghana

Our primary objective of highlighting the work we do through ourDigital Equalizer Program was largely achieved through theconference. In overall terms, we are satisfied with the outcome ofthe conference. The exhibition was very useful for us as we gotacquainted to a number of e-content vendors who could be of greatuse to us.

Chetan Kapoor, American India Foundation, India

We are extremely happy with the quality time that we could spend inthe conference as participants …

Sonjib Mukharjee, Chief Executive Officer,Metalearn Services Pvt Ltd

I am really enriched after participating the conference.Bibhas Chatterjee, Project Director, GNK-Plan


In the wrap-up and valedictorysession, key persons from Govern-ment, International development andfunding organisations, private sector,NGO practitioners shared theirexperiences of the conference.Randeep Kaur of Plan Internationalpointed out that the discussion anddeliberations in conference has shownnew light and faith in the strengths ofpartnerships and collaborations fordevelopment in general and educationin particular. With respect to ICT ineducation, the conference brought tolight interesting ideas and practices ofICTs education beyond the classroomsand curriculum to vocational educationand life skill education. Mark Surmanof telecentre.org, Rinilia Abdul

Wrap-up and Valedictory Session

A detailed report, summary ofthe key sessions and presentationswill be made available atwww.digitalLEARNING.in/DLindia

Rahim, Executive Director, GlobalKnowledge Partnership (GKP),Adrian Marti, Deputy Country Head,Swiss Agency for Development andCooperation (SDC), Dorothy Gordonof Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence inIT, Sanjeev Gupta, IT Secretary,Himachal Pradesh, India, TanmayaChakrovorty, TCS and Dr M PNarayanan, President, CSDMSexpressed their views on theconference. Various recommendationsemerged from the three-daydeliberation that reinforced the muchneeded focus on capacity building andcontent for ICT in education.

Dorothy Gordon fervently set thepath for the follow-up from this

conference in the valedictorystatement- “I want to throw achallenge to the team (organisers), totake the results of this conferencefrom various tracks to variousregional languages, put it in Hindi,put it in Kannada, etc. …haveregional meetings to discuss andfind out what do the people sayabout the findings, do they agree,do they not agree…translate thewhole thing in regionallanguages and start the debateagain...”.

Randeep Kaur, Plan International,Subhash Khuntia, MHRD, GoI

Dorothy Gordon, Kofi Annan Centre forExcellence in IT, Adrian Marti, SDC

Sanjeev Gupta, Dept. of IT, HimachalPradesh, Dr M P Narayanan, President,CSDMS

Tanmaya Chakrovorty, Tata ConsultancyServices, Mark Surman, Telecentre.org

Ravi Gupta, Director, CSDMS, convening the valedictory session

Participants expressing the views in the valedictory session

4343September 2006 | www.i4d.csdms.in

INDIAN TELECENTRE FORUM 2006 (ITF 2006), 23-25 AUGUST, NEW DELHI

Knowledge sharingthrough telecentresIndian Telecentre Forum 2006 (ITF 2006)along with two parallel events, ‘e-Gov India2006’ and ‘Digital Learning India 2006’was jointly organised by CSDMS along withseveral partners, at Hotel Taj Palace in NewDelhi (India), on 23-25 August. This was aresult of a number of collaborative steps forcreating international understanding of theneeds of telecentres in India. The welcomeaddress was delivered by M. P. Narayanan,the President of CSDMS.

The convocation ceremony of fellows of

Jamsetji Tata National Virtual AcademyFellows (NVA) followed. The fellows wereconferred with awards for their grass rootinitiatives by MSSRF. The welcome addressof the convocation was delivered by TaraGandhi, Advisor, Jamsedji Tata NationalVirtual Academy. Basheerhamad Shadrach,Senior Programme Officer, InternationalDevelopment Research Centre (IDRC)explained the outcome of the Third

National Participatory KnowledgeManagement Workshop and Plans forMission 2007 Training Commons.

Ashutosh Chadha, Manager EducationProgramme, Intel, announced the launchof Intel Learning Programme to Jamsetji TataNational Virtual Academy (NVA) and NVAfellows.

The key note address was delivered byProfessor M.S.Swaminathan, President,Jamsetji Tata National Virtual Academy.Special address was made by Kiran Karnik,

Trustee, NASSCOM Foundation and byAdrian Marti, Deputy Country Director,Swiss Agency for Development andCooperation (SDC). At the end ofconvocation ceremony, the vote of thankswas delivered by Nancy Anabel,Coordinator, NVA.

The well organised exhibition show-casing technology was inauguratedthere after.

RENDEZVOUS

An eloquent interaction with NationalVirtual Academy (NVA) fellows wasarranged, where they shared theirexperiences with the fellow participants. Thediscussion of multi level exchange of ideaswas being translated in regional languagesby facilitators to overcome the barriers ofinterchange and communication in variouslanguages.

The session was followed by Mission2007: The way forward under the leadof DC Misra, NIC, Government ofIndia reiterated ‘content’ being king.The convergence group led by ArunaSundararajan of IL&FS, Tarun Malik ofSaksham, Microsoft and V.V. Rajasekhar ofITC talked of the major telecentres modelsplanned in India. The capacity buildingdiscussions were led by Ankhi Das ofMicrosoft and Namrata Bali of SEWA. Thesession was moderated by B. Shadrach,telecentre.org/IDRC.

The day concluded with the DinnerPanel honoured by Mani Shankar Aiyer, theHon’ble Minister of Panchayati Raj andYouth Affairs and Sports, Government ofIndia. There was an award ceremony forthree innovators in the field of i4d, egovand Digital Learning (see page 32 for detailedcoverage).

From the second day of the conference,there were parallel sessions, trackedconveniently to hold the specific interest ofspeakers as well as the audience. The session‘Telecentre Models: Global experience’ wasmoderated by Mark Surman, ManagingDirector of telecentre.org/IDRC. Thepanellist were divided into distinct groups ofrepresenting nations who have proved theirinnovative potential in running thetelecentres. The participants were dividedinto groups of seven to share the experiencesby each of the representing nation.Accordingly, Aminata Maiga of Afrilinks,

NVA fellows after the convocation with the lead panelists, 23rd August 2006

4444 i4d | September 2006

Mali; Subbiah Arunachalam of MSSRF, India; Zulfikar MochamadRachman of the National Development Planning Agency, Indonesia;Harsha Liyanage of Sarvodaya, Sri Lanka; Marianna Posfai of 4CLI,Hungary; Tess Camba, Commission on Information andCommunication Technology, Philippines; Phonaphasit fromLaos; Klaus Stoll from Latin America; and Michael Gursteinfrom Canada narrated their experiences gathered in operatingtelecentres in the goodwill of the communities.

The UN Solution Exchange Workshop on KnowledgeManagement was also held parallely that highlighted theactivities of UN Solution Exchange and its onlinecommunities.

The second session of the day was on ‘RuralConnectivity’, chaired by Deepak Maheshwari of ISPAI.Vipul Sharma of Nortel made presentations on wirelesstechnologies and enabling e Governance applications,Rakesh Radha Krishnanan of Sun Micro Systems made ademonstration on e-Connectivity for PURA, PatrickVeron of Alcatel talked on WiMax- Access Connectivity,enabling a world of broadband wireless opportunities,Prof. U.B.Desai of Indian Institute of Technology, Bombaydiscussed on Wireless Mesh Networks for Rural Areas,Senthil Ayyasamy of Bharati Airtel discussed the scalablearchitecture for rural kiosks, Ashish Duggal of Gilat focused on

rural connectivity options with a focus on telecentres. MortenFalch of DTU discussed his paper ‘National Strategies forPromoting Broadband Access’. Dr.Avinash Joshi of TechMahindra focused on the rural connectivity issues in thesession.

There was a parallel session on ‘Indian Telecentre Networks:The Next Steps’, chaired by Rufina Farnandes, NASSCOMFoundation. The speakers in this session were V.V. Rajasekharfrom ITC, Satyen Mishra from Drishtee, J.S.Sandha fromJagriti eSeva, Capt K.J.S.Brar from Designmate, Surendra Ranafrom Tarahaat, Rama Hariharan from National InformaticsCentre (NIC), Government of India, Shantanu Sengupta fromGrasso and Dr. Ashok Jain from AISECT. After thepresentations, the participants discussed important issues likegovernment’s role in telecentre initiatives, sustainability issuesof the telecentres and also the sensitive issue of socialresponsibility for telecentres.

The post-lunch session was on Government Rural ICTinitiatives and IT Secretaries Panel. Shefali Dash of NIC, Governmentof India, N S Kalsi, Secretary IT, Government of Punjab, Sivasankar,Director of IT Mission Kerala State and Alok Bhargava were therepresentative members from government.

It was followed by International donors Forum ‘Investing,Engaging, and Impacting the Telecentre Movement for PovertyReduction and Achieving the MDGs’. Introductory remarks weremade by Richard Gerster and San Ng of the Asia Foundation,USA facilitated a marketplace session after taking the participants’inputs and questions to the donors. Hyunjung Lee of ADB ofPhilippines, Adrian Marti of SDC, Mark Surman and B.Shadrachof telecentre.org/IDRC, Jody Mahoney of Tech Soup, USA, JocelyneJosiah of UNESCO, and Maxine Olson of UNDP.

The third day of the panel discussion focused on Telecentres:Where can India be in 2010.The discussion panel went eloquentwith DC Misra of NIC, Government of India on e Governanceefforts on Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) in various states. N.Subramanian, a research scientist from CDAC, Bangalore focussedon research and training methods that to be repeated between lab

International Telecentre thought leaders sharing their experties to the

Indian Telecentre Community, 24 August 2006

Rural connectivity session with eminent panelists in progress, 24 August 2006

The International donors marketplace highlighting ‘Investing, Engaging, and Impacting

the Telecentre Movement’ strategies

4545September 2006 | www.i4d.csdms.in

livelihood and job creating potential and as a resource centrefor community development in rural areas. ShagunDhakhwa of Madan Puraskar Pustakalaya (MPP), an NGOin Nepal working in the preservation of Nepali languageand literature, besides FOSS in the respective language,made his presentation on ‘Sambad’. Shikha Shrestha ofBellanet, Nepal in her presentation wanted ICT’s tobecome a medium of voice for the voiceless. The telecentres,should work on ICT4D network promotion, research andcapacity building, localisation and technologicalinnovations and advocate for ICT policies, she remarked.Sharad Babu Shrestha of READ Nepal shared his successstory of rural libraries becoming telecentres.

The session on ‘Case studies from India’ had RogerHarris from Roger Harris Associates, Hong Kong,T.K.Omana from RASTA (an NGO in Kerala, India),Ashish Saboo from Association of ICT Tools Access

Providers and T.N. Anuradha from OneWorld South Asia sharingtheir valuable experiences in India in the field of telecentres. Withthe international telecentre specialists, another session was held tocollate the recommendations.

A discussion on work plan for the telecentre movement to moveforward was held in the post-lunch session on the third day of theconference. The session was entitled as ‘2010 roadmap and vision:How do we get there?’ Implementable and thought ideas wereshared with a group of international experts like Radhika Lal ofUNDP, New York, B. Shadrach of IDRC/telecentre.org, Veena Joshiof SDC and Ankhi Das from Microsoft.

All the sessions concluded with valedictory session, chaired byDr. M. P. Narayanan, President of CSDMS. The panellists wereAdrian Marti, Deputy Country Head, SDC, Piti Premotedham,Managing Director, Asia South, Computer Associates, Subhash CKhuntia, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Human Resource Development(MHRD), Government of India. There was an interactive discussionon the conference outputs among the participants and panellists.The triple conference concluded with a vote of thanks by RaviGupta, Director of CSDMS.

A detailed conference report with recommendations will be soon availableon the web. log on to www.i4donline.net/indiantelecentreforum

and ground to bridge the digital divide and Tarun Malik of Saksham,Microsoft.

The second parallel session was held on ‘Relevant technologieswith impact in the telecentre movement’, chaired by MichaelGurstein. Four papers were presented in this session by DeepakMenon, Microsoft Research India, Zulfikar Mochamad Rachmanof The National Development Planning Agency, Indonesia,Prashant Chaudhary of Computer Associates and Hyunjung Leeof Asian Development Bank (ADB). After the presentations, aninteractive discussion was held among the participants and presentersregarding the issues like partnership in telecentre initiatives,corruption problem, strategies for assisting telecentres, etc.

The session on ‘South Asian Telecentre Experiences’ was chairedby S. Abbasi of DIT, Government of India. Md Shahid UddinAkbar, ICT for Development Programme, Bangladesh outlinedthe challenges of Telecentres: an increasing trend of content dividein developing countries. He raised the question, why at all a teacher,farmer or student from a rural area should go to telecentre! A H MSultanur Reza, A M M Yahya of Grameen Phone Ltd., Bangladeshshared a feasibility study on telecentres for sustainability, Prof LutforRahman, Founder Vice Chancellor, Pundra University ofScience and Technology, Bangladesh viewed telecentres from

The ITF 2006 delegates in rapt attention during a session in progress, 25th

August 2006

Telecentres: Where can India be in 2010? Panelists deliberate

Collating the recommendations to the Indian Telecentre Forum 2006

Documents

Conference Report