Most Respected Shri Ram Nath Kovindji, Hon’ble President of India,
Shri Pinarayi Vijayan, Hon’ble Chief Minister,
Dr. A.Sampath, Member of Parliament,
Shri C.Divakaran, Member of Legislative Assembly,
Dr. K.M.Abraham, Chief Secretary, Kerala
Shri M Sivasankar, Secretary, Electronics and IT Department
Sahodaree Sahodaranmaare,
Ellaavarkkum Ente Namaskaaram,
It gives me great joy and pride to preside over the function to launch the Techno-city and to lay the foundation stone for the first Government IT building in the proposed Techno-city Project. The presence of our Hon’ble Rashtrapatiji, who has kindly consented to lay the foundation stone, makes this occasion really historic. On behalf of the people of Kerala, let me extend a warm and cordial welcome to our Hon’ble Rashtrapatiji.
Our beloved State of Kerala, which had won the world's admiration through high literacy and indexes of human development, is now in the process of bridging the digital divide to ensure social and economic inclusiveness through full e-literacy and Digital empowerment at the grass-roots level.
With the highest Mobile and Internet penetration, Kerala is now poised to establish a knowledge-powered digital society by the year 2020. Kerala views Digital Technology as the fuel that would propel the future economy. Already, we rank 8th in the export byIT andIT Enabled Services units registered with Software Technology Parks of India. So far, the State has created 15 million square feet of IT infrastructure space under the Government's IT parks and we hope to employ over one lakh people in the three phases that have so far been undertaken.
Here, it is worthwhile to mention a word about the growth achieved by the Technopark in Thiruvananthapuram. It is now the largest Information Technology Park in Asia in terms of built up area. The Technopark, established in 1990, is now among the largest in the country and one of the world's greenest Technology parks. The Info Park, Kochi and the Cyberpark in Kozhikode also have been registering considerable growth. The Techno-city campus that we launch today as the fourth stage of development of the IT infrastructure, would label Kerala as the world's most preferred destination for frontier Technologies.
I feel that the social impact of the development of the Information Technology sector, the Techno-city and the Knowledge-City as a centre of Excellence, will be felt not only in the area of technology, but also in Higher Education and Employment. With the proposed Knowledge-city sharing its expertise in Space science, Cyber-security and related future technologies with our students, we will have a generation of youth equipped with key competencies suited to the industry. Expecting such favorable conditions, the Government has already initiated several measures to provide skill development across teaching institutions directly and through the on-line mode. All these would eventually make Kerala a leader in leveraging the demographic dividend that India hopes to enjoy in the coming years.
Let us not forget that the huge investment in the IT sector has to be justified through the services it would offer to the people at the grass-roots level. The technology must also be used to ensure faster, easier and more transparent delivery of the Government's services to the common man.
This requires the qualitative updating of our core infrastructure and connectivity. I am happy that Kerala has envisioned to connect all its infrastructure and communication technology toprovide access to different departmental databases and to widen the scope of service delivery. The plan to provide free internet connections to 20 lakh poor families through Kerala Fibre Optic Network (K-FON) is a result of this vision.
While digital progress is a promising development, we cannot ignore some concerns of the less digitally equipped people. A major concern is language, since a large share of digital services is offered through English. I would suggest a service delivery in the local language to avoid language being a barrier for ordinary people to make use of digital services. Better still, let us think of using voice recognition to provide such services through mobile phones that use the least complex technology.
Let me conclude with the hope that the Techno-city would succeed both in placing Kerala on the centre stage of the world's IT sector and in winning the full confidence of the ordinary citizens of our country through various services.
With these words, I request our Hon’ble Rashtrapatiji to launch the Techno-City Project and to lay the Foundation stone for the first IT building of the Government in the Techno-City.
Ellavarkkum Ente Aashamsakal
Nanni
Jai Hind
