eINDIA2009Welcome Address by Dr M P Narayanan

The honourable minister and other eminent dignitaries, welcome to the fifth edition of the annual ICT conference and exhibition. eINDIA2009 is organised in association with Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and IT. Acknowledged as one of its kind ICT for development event for the country and even for the region, eIndia event series has witnessed enormous growth in the last 5 years, growth from strength to strength.

Expanding its horizons, terms, coverage, intellectual value addition, stakeholder engagement and last but not the least, the overwhelming response of people from every nook and corner of the ICT ecosystem, standing across the government, industry, international agencies, research organisations, academic institutions, etc.

We have more than 300 speakers across 5 thematic tracks, with delegates from more than 40 countries, comprising Asia, Africa, Middle East, Europe, Latin America, North America, etc., eIndia2009 has been able to garner enthusiasm from among both national and international communities. On this occasion, I am once again, happy to extend a very very warm welcome to the honourable chief guest, Hon Minister, Madam Purandeswari, to the VIP officials, luminaries present over here and to the distinguished delegates, members of media, and all the ladies and gentlemen over here. I thank you all once again for becoming an integral and important part of eIndia2009 and while assuring you of a congregation & consultation of the highest level, for making this a truly fruitful and the most essential experience.

We are extremely thankful to the Government of India for the recently announced measures, to boost economic growth in the country. CSDMS, along with the entire Information Technology industry, wholeheartedly welcomes these initiatives and extends its full support to the Government of India in all possible manners to tide over the tough economic climate.

One of the foundations for emerging stronger from the recent downturn is to invest in areas that focus on improving a country’s productivity and competitiveness. We all realize the need to stimulate growth in labour and growth intensive sectors such as physical infrastructure and small and medium enterprises, to boost the economy. Similarly, investments in National Information Infrastructure and Human Capital Development, together which is known as Digital Infrastructure, will have a positive impact on employment generation, building efficiencies into our system, productivity and innovation. The importance of this is more relevant for a nation like India, with a large population base.

Additionally, global studies have shown a strong linkage of information technology adoption and emergence of an energy efficient economy. With the cost of energy expected to go up in the coming times, encouraging IT based investment today in traditional industries like power grids, logistics & transportation etc., that are not yet IT enabled, will go a long way in reducing our per capita spend on power. This will help save precious foreign exchange as well as hasten our journey towards being one of the top economies.

Aligned with the same objectives, CSDMS few months back convened with some senior officials from the three Northern Indian States, Chandigarh, Punjab, and Haryana, who met during the conference to recognise the progress and successes already achieved in the field of e-Inclusion and to consider the challenges that still remain. The White papers submitted by CSDMS towards e-Inclusion in the three states speaks more about its continuous effort for taking stock of what still lies ahead and renew our commitments to achieve inclusion in the information society for all.

Today, technology implementations may reach across campuses, institutions, departments, offices and other workplaces and often require the integration of systems involving both academic and business units. It’s a collaborative approach that needs not only technology, but also strong leaders who know how to engage whole communities as well as top-level strategists.On this backdrop, e INDIA 2009 will provide a forum to examine the challenges that appear in ICT and development, to share and work together, to analyse and assess, as well as to create actionable plans for leading technology enabled development while learning about the latest trends and talks.

The country is now looking towards creating a National ICT policy in school education. The Ministry of HRD has already initiated a consultative mechanism on a draft policy document in order to make it a truely democratic process. The policy is expected to provide goals, framework and minimum set of standards essential for integrating the use of ICT in education. I remember, two years before, in this eINDIA platform in 2007, the then Secetary of School Education in the Ministry of HRD placed the much needed policy agenda of ICT in school education, while delivering his inaugural speech. The very next year, in this same eINDIA platform, our Hon Minister, Madam Purandeswari released a compendium of stakeholder views and suggestions on the proposed Policy framework for ICT in school education. I firmly believe, the compendium published by CSDMS and GeSCI will still be proved an important document today that will strengthen the consultative process initiated by the Ministry of HRD towards giving shape the National Policy.

The dialoguing process through such conferencing, celebrated achievements, and showcased suc-cesses will continue in future. With this Hyderabad chapter of eINDIA, we have moved out of the national capital region, in the process of taking the platform to every region, to every state, to every city...With this, our continuous effort for strenghthening research, network, conferencing, and dialoguing process for the development community, for sure will experience the competitive advantage provided by the world class IT advantage.

The conference is going to see many more new congregations this year, a conclave of School Leaders, conclave of University leaders, conclave of industry leaders, health IT vendors meet, some special symposiums, organised by ISOC, UN Solution Exchange, and EU, and lot many new perspectives are seen to be added over the next three days.

As a continuous effort to make the eINDIA Forum all encompassing, we’ll also confer eINDIA 2009 Awards to distinguish professionals and institutions working primarily on the domains of ICT for Development. eINDIA Awards are the annual attempts to assess the role of Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) in developmental programmes and to recognise the

great practitioners who use ICTs for expediting sustainable development in five thematic tracks- e-Agriculture, e-Governance, Digital Learning, e-Health, and Indian Telecentre Forum.

In closing, I would like to congratulate each and every of the participant here for once again bringing this platform for discussion and dialogue and bringing together the practitioners from India and other countries, to share ideas, experience and best practices of using ICT to improve the quality of lives of the citizens of all countries. I am sure that you would find the next 3 days rewarding.

I must say, Goals, dreams, and wishes do come true! Today, our goal to connect the world of ICTs has come true. Now, our wish to take ‘e’ along INDIA and make eINDIA a phenomenon will certainly come true. Our journey through past five years has been the yard stick of all our wishful dreams and goals.

I once again extend a very hearty and warm welcome to all of you.