Now
the world is heading towards a concept of global village connecting every
organization and individuals through Internet, Indian villages are yet to
receive the simplest of it, the telephones. Information Technology as a
tool has broken many barriers in availing, using information across the
world and increased the efficiency of organization and individuals.
Technological up gradation continuously leads to change in the instruments
used, making them cheaper and reaching the households in a faster pace.
However there exists a great difference in the usage between urban and
rural, rich and poor, for profit and charities.
DHAN Foundation, conscious of the technical change and ‘poor being left’ in the whole process desires to make its efforts through their professionals to keep the disadvantaged in fore. In this regard, the Foundation envisages the following roles in general related to its programs on Information technology:
Making Information technology accessible to poor by developing relevant schemes through research and pilot activities. Experiment and conduct socially relevant and needed programs related to micro finance, agriculture, education, health and social development as an organizational program. Collaborating with research and academic institutions on e-governance and computer education at schools.
DHAN Foundation intends to continue the program to achieve meaningful and sustainable result in this theme. In the next three years DHAN Foundation would join hands with like-minded professionals and institutes in this venture and take up following activities and service, which would be serving the rural population in general:
Village Information Centres : DHAN Foundation has 40 village information centres under this project. Internet facility is provided with the help of Wireless Local Loop (WLL) technology developed by IIT, Chennai. The project has provided dot matrix printers also to all village information centres. The Internet usage is chargeable and the fees are to be paid to the ISP, n-Logue Communications. DHAN Foundation has upgraded all village information centres with latest web based servises. The village information centres are selected for based on the number of households in the village, potential of the village for income generation and the need for development.
DHAN
Foundation identified the members of Kalanjiam Community Banking - Self
Help Groups to run communication centers in the villages as a business for
them. Commercial and developmental services are being provided in these
village information centres . These include Computer Education at low cost including hardware, e-governance,
Eye-care applications, Agriculture information, Innovative technologies
for grassroots development in Agriculture and Animal husbandry, E-mailing,
Browsing and E-Commerce.
Services: The major source of income for the operators so far has been computer education to children. Browsing and e-mailing generated only moderate income so far. By using the computers and the other communication devices these centers set up in the small and big hamlets offer the following services.
E-Post: In this,
a person from a village information centre can send a message to any person in another
village information centre through e-mail.
The
village information centre operator receiving the message arranges the delivery to the address.
We promise to deliver the message with in two hours of sending. We are
proud to announce here that several messages were sent and received on the
first day itself.
E-governance: Currently, it covers birth certificate, death certificate, old age pension, widow pension, destitute women pension. We have started this in five of our village information centres that have printers.
Eye-care: The eye care arrangement with Aravind Hospital, Madurai has started in our village information centres . Three of our village information centres have web camera and they have started this.
E-Commerce: In this, anyone can enter the details of things one wants to buy/sell. The message will be sent to all the village information centres . When another person wants to sell/buy the same thing, a match is found for the transaction. The village information centres involved in finding the seller and the buyer will receive commissions when the transaction occurs. We expect this activity to generate considerable income to the kiosk operators.
Agricultural services: New technologies for locally needed crops with local wisdom and inputs on land preparation, seed preparation, crop production, post harvest and water management.
Health Services: Traditional Health and Healing practices along with the modern, easy to use information on preventive Health, First Aid and other stock of Health Information would be made available in these villages to serve them.
Educational
& Training Services:
Interactive learning tools for the illiterate or semi-literate along with
library services for local students. Training on women on finance,
entrepreneurship and other ventures at their village level through these
centers.
Market Information Services on Agriculture Produce and Inputs: The following services related to rural and sub-urban localities will be made available through the village information centres. Market information related to produce like vegetables, grains and important inputs other data will be provided on line with reliability.
The
Adult Literacy Program:
The Adult Literacy Program was taken up from March 2002 in five centers in
Alanganallur block, Madurai District in collaboration with TATA
Consultancy Services, Chennai and Confederation of Indian Industry,
Madurai Chapter. Almost all of them now recognize and read bus routes,
names, boards etc.
Kalanjiam Computer Training Centers: Three Computer training centers are started as community colleges in Melur, Kottampatti and Alanganallur in Madurai District. The objective is to provide high quality computer education to rural poor students at cost covering, low fees to improve their career prospects. The centers are owned by the Community Banking federations themselves. So far around 620 students have completed the courses. Many are kiosk operators and several have got jobs outside.
Computer and Internet to Schools: Currently, DHAN has provided computers to two schools. These are being used for computer education. We have identified ten schools for setting up computer and internet facilities under the SARI project. Educational CD's will be provided to make the students understand their subjects better.
Intermediate Devices for Micro finance: The data management and transfer in micro finance is a difficult job. Data is recorded at the grass roots level which involves multiple entries. Data has to be transferred to multiple higher levels and to be consolidated at different levels. This process, when done manually, may lead to errors at different levels and takes a lot of time for transfer and reduces efficiency in management. To prevent this, we are field testing certain hand held devices for single entry and immediate transfer and consolidation of data. iStation is one such device. All the transactions can be recorded in this and can be transferred by email. Currently, the programming is being done to customize this device for our micro finance requirements. It will be tested in kottampatti block. Data vision is another such device. All the transactions will be recorded in this device. when the field person goes to federation office he/she can upload the data into the system there.