Contact Number to become Identity

The government of India is planning to provide its services with mobile governance and soon may make the mobile number a defacto identity of a person. The government wants to give a digital identity to each and every citizen which is unique and authentication. There are about 900 million mobile connections and 700 millions have…

Aadhaar to be used as ‘digital identity’ for mobile banking

The union government under its ambitious ‘Digital India’ programme has decided to use the Aadhaar number as a “digital identity” for the purpose of mobile banking. The Aadhaar number would be linked with the mobile number as well as the bank account number of the individual. The announcement was made by the secretary, Department of Electronics & Information Technology, Government…

Maximum government, maximum governance

One of Narendra Modi’s key promises in the run-up to the 2014 national election that enthused voters and investors alike was the mantra of “minimum government, maximum governance”. But with a jumbo-sized cabinet and a finance ministry that seems to favour scale expansion as a counter-cyclical strategy to drive growth, Modi has found it difficult…

Need to redesign structure for skilling India

The union minister of state (independent charge) for skill development, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, recently said that India’s skilled workforce is 2%, compared to over 75% in all major economies. In this backdrop, the government us working on a new skill development policy to address shortcomings of the existing policy. Although skill development can improve “employment-readiness”,…

Rural village gets a digital makeover

A two-hour drive from Gandhinagar, Gujarat’s administrative heartland, is the small, nondescript hamlet of Akodara in Sabarkantha district. With a population of just 1,054 as per the 2011 census, the primary occupation of villagers here is farming and dairy. What has catapulted this progressive little village on to the national map as a model for…