Digital India

Digital Indiais an initiative by theGovernment of India to ensure that

Government services are made available to citizens electronically by improving
online infrastructure and by increasing Internet connectivity. It was launched on
July 1, 2015 byPrime Minister Narendra Modi. The initiative includes plans to
connectruralareas withhigh-speed internet networks. Digital India has three
core components.

These include:
The creation of digital infrastructure
Delivering services digitally
Digital literacy
A two-way platform will be created where both the service providers and the
consumers stand to benefit. The scheme will be monitored and controlled by the
Digital India Advisory group which will be chaired by the
Ministry of Communications and IT.It will be an inter-Ministerial initiative where
all ministries and departments shall offer their own services to the public
Healthcare ,Education ,Judicialservices etc. ThePublicprivate partnership
model shall be adopted selectively. In addition, there are plans to restructure
theNational Informatics Centre . This project is one among the top priority
projects of the Modi Administration.

Project
Broadband in 2.5 lakh villages, universal phone connectivity,
Net Zero Imports by 2020, 400,000 Public Internet Access
Points, Wi-fi in 2.5 lakh schools, all universities; Public wi-fi
hotspots for citizens, Digital Inclusion: 1.7 Cr trained for IT,
Telecom and Electronics Jobs Job creation: Direct 1.7 Cr. and
Indirect at least 8.5 Cr.e-Governance & eServices: Across
government India to be leader in IT use in services health,
education, banking Digitally empowered citizens public
cloud, internet access. The Government of India entity
Bharat Broadband Network Limitedwhich executes the
National Optical Fibre Networkproject will be the custodian
ofDigital India(DI) project.BBNL had ordered
United Telecoms Limitedto connect 250,000 villages through
GPON to ensure FTTH based broadband. This will provide the
first basic setup to achieve towards Digital India and is
expected to be completed by 2017. Optical fibre cables have
been laid out in more than 68000 village panchayats.

are nine pillars of Digital India

Programme.
Broadband Highways
Universal Access to Mobile Connectivity
Public Internet Access Programme
e-Governance Reforming Government
through Technology
eKranti - Electronic delivery of services
Information for All
Electronics Manufacturing
IIT for Jobs
Early Harvest Programmes

There

Pillars

Services

Some of the facilities which will be provided through this

initiative are Digital Locker, e-education, e-health, e-sign
and national scholarship portal. As the part ofDigital
India, Indian government planned to launch Botnet
cleaning centers.
DigiLocker
Digital Locker facility will help citizens to digitally store their
important documents like PAN card, passport, mark sheets
and degree certificates. Digital Locker will provide secure
access to Government issued documents. It uses
authenticity services provided by Aadhaar. It is aimed at
eliminating the use of physical documents and enables
sharing of verified electronic documents across government
agencies.
Attendance.gov.in
A website was launched on 1 July 2015 byPM
Narendra Modito keep a record of the attendance of
Government employees on a real-time basis. This initiative
started with implementation of a common Biometric

Partnerships
Digital India Week
At the launch ceremony of Digital India Week by Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, top CEOs from
India and abroad committed to invest4.5lakhcrore(US$68billion) towards this initiative.
The CEOs said the investments would be utilitized towards making smartphones and internet
devices at an affordable price in India which would help generate jobs in India as well as
reduce the cost of importing them from abroad.
Reliance IndustriesChairmanMukesh Ambanisaid his company would invest2.5lakhcrore
(US$38billion) across different Digital India heads, which have the potential to create
employment for over five lakh people. He also announced setting up of the 'Jio Digital India
Start Up Fund' to encourage young entrepreneurs who are setting up businesses focused
around the Digital India initiative.Bharti GroupchiefSunil Mittalcommitted investments of
more than1lakhcrore(US$15billion) in the next five years to create deeper infrastructure
in rural and urban India in the areas ofe-healthand e-education.
Silicon Valley
Tech Giants fromSilicon Valley,San Jose,Californiaexpressed their support for Digital India
duringPMNarendra Modi's visit in September 2015.Facebook's CEO,Mark Zuckerberg,
changed his DP in support of Digital India and started a chain on Facebook and promised to
work on WiFi Hotspots in rural India.Googlecommitted to provide broadband connectivity on
500 railway stations inIndia.Microsoftagreed to provide broadband connectivity to five
hundred thousand villages in India and make India its cloud hub through Indian data centres.
Qualcommannounced an investment of $150 million in Indian startups.Oracle plans to invest
in 20 states and will work on payments andSmart cityinitiatives.

Swachh Bharat Abhiyan

Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is a national campaign by the
Government of India, covering 4041 statutory towns, to
clean the streets, roads and infrastructure of the country.
The campaign was officially launched on 2 October 2014 at
Rajghat,New Delhi, where Prime MinisterNarendra Modi
himself cleaned the road. It was a remembrance toGandhi
's words. It is India's biggest ever cleanliness drive and
3million government employees and school and college
students of India participated in this event.The mission was
started by Prime Minister Modi, who nominated nine famous
personalities for the campaign, and they took up the
challenge and nominated nine more people and so on. It
has been carried forward since then with people from all
walks of life joining it.

Objectives
This campaign aims to accomplish the vision of a 'Clean India' by 2 October
2019, the 150th birthday ofMahatma Gandhi .
Specific objectives are:
Elimination ofopen defecation
Conversion of unsanitarytoiletsto pour flush toilets (a type ofpit latrine,
usually connected to two pits)
Eradication ofmanual scavenging
100% collection and processing/disposal/reuse/recycling of municipal solid
waste
Abehavioural changein people regarding healthysanitationpractices
Generation of awareness among citizens aboutsanitationand its linkages
withpublic health
Supporting urban local bodies in designing, executing and operating waste
disposal systems
Facilitating private-sector participation in capital expenditure and
operation and maintenance costs for sanitary facilities.

JAM Trinity: Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar and Mobile

number
A new jargon , JAM Trinity,Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhar, Mobile numbers,
has become the Indians finance buzzword since it found place in
two important documents recently, The Economic Survey 2014-15
and the Union Budget 2015-16.According to the Economic
Survey of 2014, there are about 125.5 million Jan Dhan bank
accounts,17,757 million Aadhaar numbers, and 904 million
mobile phones.This article explains in detail the JAM Trinity :Jan
Dhan Yojana, Aadhar, Mobiles in India.
JAM Trinity and Subsidies
JAM is an abbreviation for Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar and
Mobile number. It was coined by Chief Economic Advisor, Arvind
Subramanian, and was first used forEconomic Survey on 28th Feb
2015.It is supposed to be a game changing reform that will
allow transfer of benefits in a leakage-proof, well-targeted
and cashless manner.Lets go through the various components of
JAM.

Jan Dhan Bank Accounts

In India around 40 per cent of the population is unbanked.To bring banks to the people Pradhan
Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) was launched in Aug 2014. Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna account
can be opened in any bank branch or Business Correspondent (Bank Mitr) outlet. PMJDY accounts are
opened with Zero balance. However, if the account-holder wishes to get cheque book, he will have to fulfill
minimum balance criteria.
Features of Bank accounts under PMJDY Scheme are
No Minimum Balance.
Interest on deposit.Interest is presently at 4 % in most of the banks.
RuPay Debit Card.Rupay Debit Card provides accidental insurance cover upto Rs.1.00 lakh without any
charge to the customer.To get benefit of Accidental Insurance Cover, RuPay Debit Card must be used at
least once in 45 days.
Life insurance cover of Rs. 30,000.Only one person in the family will be covered in the Bima Scheme and
in case of the person having multiple cards / accounts the benefit will be allowed only under one card i.e.
one person per family will get a single cover of Rs.30,000, subject to the eligibility conditions.The life cover
of Rs 30,000 under the scheme will be initially for a period of 5 years, i.e. till the close of financial year
2019-20. Thereafter, the scheme will be reviewed and terms and condition of its continuation, including
the issue of future payment of premium by the insured thereafter, would be suitably determined.
Overdraft facility upto Rs 5000 is available in only one account per household, preferably lady of the
household. It is permitted only after satisfactory operation of the account for 6 months
Beneficiaries of Government Schemes will get Direct Benefit Transfer in these accounts.
Who Cannot open: Persons whose income is taxable under I.T. Act 1961 or are filing the yearly Income
Tax return or in whose case TDS is being deducted from the income, and their families

 Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) is National Mission for Financial

Inclusion to ensure access to financial services, namely, Banking or Savings
& Deposit Accounts, Remittance, Credit, Insurance, Pension in an affordable
manner.As many as 11.5 crore bank accounts have been opened
under thePradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, exceeding the enhanced
target of 10 crore and covering 99.74 per cent of households.Rs 9,000
crore has been deposited in theJan Dhan accounts. Prime Minister
Narendra Modi announced the financial inclusion scheme in his first
Independence Day speech on 15 Aug 2014. It was launched in August with a
target to open bank accounts for 7.5 crore poor persons by January 26,
2015. The target was later increased to 10 crore accounts.The
achievement,under Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, was recognised by
theGuinness Book of World Recordson 20th January 2015.
In its citation, the Guinness Book said: Most bank accounts
opened in one week as part of the Financial Inclusion Campaign is
18,096,130 and was achieved by the Department of Financial
Services, Government of India from August 23 to 29, 2014.

Aadhaar
Aadhaar , which meansfoundation,is a unique 12-digit Identification number issued
to individuals for the purpose of establishing unique identification of every single
person. Its purpose is to eliminate the fake identities and documents from the government
records.Aadhaar Card serves as an Address Proof and an identity proof, especially for
those who do not have a passport or a driving license.As many as 76.83 crore Aadhaar
numbers,out of a total population of 121.01 crore (Census 2011), have been generated as on
February 15,2015 and about Rs 5,512.18 crore has been spent until January 2015 on the
project.The government has approved an outlay of Rs 13,663.22 crore for the period 2009-17.
In Aadhaar uniqueness is determined through the biometric (fingerprints, iris scan, photograph)
and demographic (residential address) details of the individuals.
Any resident of India including infants can enrol for Aadhaar. Even NRIs and foreign citizens
residing in India can also enrol for Aadhaar.
Aadhaar is not a card or a smart card rather it is a number which is unique for every beneficiary
of it.
No fee will be charged at any stage under this scheme
Aadhaar number will remain valid for life.
Aadhaar number will help you provide access to services like banking, mobile phone
connections and other Govt and Non-Govt services in due course.
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is the regulatory body on the behalf of
government.

 Aadhaar program was launched in 2009 with a main objective to give

universal identity to every resident Indian. Initiallypeople faced lot of
difficulties during enrolment such as technical snags, incorrect data
displayed etc. Also the importance of Aadhaar card was
unclear.With the passage of time, importance of Aadhar card
has greatly increased as compared to what it was meant for
at the time of its inception. With the new governments
willingness to continue the previous governments ambitious Aadhaar
project, the value of Aadhaar has drastically increased.Aadhaar
card will be identity proof of every individual in future.Since
the details of Aadhar card holder are kept at secure online servers,
the bio-metrically verified identity of an individual can be used to
confirm the identity of its holder.The Supreme Court of India
passed an interim order on 23 September 2013 that no public
services such as LPG can be denied to public due to lack of
Aadhaar.Lets look at Where all is Aadhaar being used.

 LPG Subsidy Government has started the PAHAL Scheme under which the subsidy
amount of LPG cylinder is directly transferred into the Aadhaar number linked bank account
of the consumer.Well one can avail LPG Subsidy without Aadhar also.
Passport: Aadhar card is necessary for issuance of new Passport.The Ministry of External
Affairs (MEA) will now be using Aadhar Card for identification of the applicant and on the
National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) database for validation of ones criminal
antecedents.If you have an Aadhaar card, you can get passport in just 10 days.
Under this format, police verification will be done at a later date as opposed to the previous
rule requiring police verification which used to be time consuming.
Buying new vehicle and Driving License Andhra Pradesh government madeAadhaar
card mandatory for registering new vehicles and obtaining driving licence. It has also
decided to link all existing vehicle owners and driving licence holders with Aadhaar number.
Bank Account:The guinessworld record holderschemePradhan Mantri Jan Dhan
Yojana(PMJDY) accepts Aadhaar card/number as the only document sufficient to open the
bank account.

Voter Card Linking: Starting 9th March 2015, Aadhaar card UIDAI number would be linked
to the voter IDs. This will eliminate bogus voters.The deadline for linking Aadhaar with
voter ID card is Aug 2015.By May, the Southern states of Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu,
Karnataka, Kerala and Goa will complete the linking.

 Monthly Pension:The Indian Government haslaunchedan Aadhaar-based digital life certificate

calledJeevan Pramaanfor pensioners, to make the process of pension payments simpler. This will do away
with the requirement of a pensioner to submit a physical life certificate in November each year, in order to
ensure the continuity of pension being credited into his or her account.Currently, 50 lakh individuals draw
pension from the central government alone. A similar number draw pension from state and Union Territory
governments. Several state-run companies also provide pension benefits and over 25 lakh retired personnel
draw pension from the armed forces.
New SIM Card: The SIM purchaser has to give his or her Aadhaar number at the time of purchase and give
the digital impression of fingers by pressing them on a machine.The pilot project kicked start from March 4,
2015 in metros like Delhi, Kolkata, Lucknow and Bangalore that have nearly fullAadhaarpenetration and will
run for six weeks. Vodafone was the first operator to roll out new amendment about new mobile sim
activation, recommended by Department of Telecom (DOT) India.
Digital Locker: Digital Locker isDedicated personal storage space, linked to each residents Aadhaar
number. DigiLocker can be used to securely store e-documents as well as store Uniform Resource Identifier
(URI) link of e-documents issued by various issuer departments. Each digital locker gives 10MB of free space
to store documents.The e-Sign facility provided as part of DigiLocker system can be used to digitally sign edocuments.A beta version was released on 10.02.2015 by the Department of Electronics and Information
Technology (DeitY)It can be accessed through the websitewww.digilocker.gov.in
Provident Fund:Similar to pension, provident fund money will be given to the account holder whove
registered their Aadhaar number with employee providentfund organization (EPFO).
Attendance of Government Employees The union government is asking its employees to use biometric
attendance system, based on Aadhaar.The Biometric Attendance System Dashboard ,www.attendance.gov.in
,gets updated realtime. It has thrown up some interesting statistics. Central Government employees seem to
be on their toes and are spending extra time in their offices ever since the Aadhaar enabled Biometric
Attendance System (AEBAS) was launched in September 2014.

Mobile and India

There are almost 900 millionmobile phone usersin India.Telecom industry in India has come a long
way from Dhirubhai Ambani pioneer offer in 2000, which envisioned a mobile handset in every Indian
household. Today, after 14 years, we have more mobile phones than toilets.The falling cost of
handsets, coupled with improved usability and increasing network coverage, are factors that are
making mobile technology a global phenomenon.By 2020, 90% of the world population over 6 years
old will have a mobile phone, with number of smartphones reaching 6.1 billion.
Mobile is no longer just a mode of communication.There is an increased convergence of
wireless and mobility as industry moves from connectivity to applications.With the advent of new
technologies, telecom is now enabling healthcare, education, financial inclusion and
much more. It has the capacity to be a connecting platform between the government and citizens
as well. For example, a fisherman who was previously clueless about the sales and demand of his
fishes can now call from the sea for this information, and knows well in advance where he needs to
deliver the products to maximize profits. AsIndia adds more internet consumers buying online will
increase. Majority of the transactions (if not everything) will be on mobile sets and from the middle
class. They are the targeted customers of e-commerce companies and getting more comfortable
buying on mobile sets (and online shopping).Remote areas are now getting access to courses from
all across the globe through internet and mobile. The consumption of video content is witnessing a
massive growth and is one of the major enablers in e-learning sector.Telecom industry is going
to be a key driver for Indias economic growth.But An average Indian spends almost 5 hours
accessing internet and out of the 3 hours spent on mobile internet, only 45 minutes are spent doing
any other work apart from social media.Our articlesWhat is Mobile Banking ?
What are Mobile Wallets or Digital Wallets A snapshot ofSocial, Digital & Mobile in India 2014