Information Society Watch

August 05, 2007, I4d Online

This is an interview with the Joint Secretary of West Bengal State Rural Development Agency. He talks about challenges and implementation plans, while highlighting that the village panchayat is in charge of implementing the Common Service Centres (CSC) scheme in the state and not the IT department. This is significant, since implementation of e-governance projects by the IT department is seen to be the primary reason of failure of these projects.

2007, Savita Bailur, MIT Press Journal

Involving stakeholders is often seen as a means to more successful information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) projects. Hence, it can be appropriate to research ICT4D projects by taking both the perspective of stakeholder theory and using the tools of stakeholder analysis. This paper uses the example of telecenter projects to illustrate the application of a stakeholder perspective, selecting the specific case of the Gyandoot telecenters in Madhya Pradesh, India.

2006, Rajendra Kumar and Michael Best, The Journal of Community Informatics

In a study of social diffusion of telecentreuse in rural south India, the authors find that these centres are being used only by a relatively small proportion of the village households despite their having been in operation for well over a year. Based on a survey of the telecentre users, they find that these users are, in general, young, male, school or college students, relatively more educated, belong to relatively higher income households, and come from socially and economically advanced communities.

November 9, 2006, Athar Osama, Scidev.net

The author contends that serious problems of development must first be confronted before the potential of ICT for development can be fulfilled. Despite the many examples of 'successful' projects, mainly in India, the myths of ICT in development abound.

December 2004, John Paul, Digital Dividend

In a country where rural telecommunications infrastructure has traditionally been installed only through licensing obligations, n-Logue Communications Ltd. has created a for-profit business model designed to affordably meet the latent demand for rural connectivity. n-Logue aims to fulfill its stated mission of "significantly enhancing the quality of life of every rural Indian" by setting up a profitable network of wirelessly-connected Internet kiosks in villages throughout India.

February 2006, D.C. Misra, Dr. N. Vijayaditya, National Informatics Centre

This paper provides an account of some of the major initiatives undertaken by National Informatics Centre (NIC) in collaboration with Indian government in the area of Development Informatics, particularly touching the rural domain. NIC has been spearheading the application of ICT to streamline government functioning across the length and breadth of the country, and right down to the grassroots level.

Anikar M. Haseloff

It is often argued that cybercafes could help bridge the digital divide, as they provide Internet access to people who cannot afford to have Internet connections at their homes or who need help in order to make use of ICTs. The following study seeks to test this assumption, and also explore the problems and potential of cyber-cafes.

2005, Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Centre, Stanford University

This report explains the problems facing rural usage of ICT and makes recommendations on how to improve usage.