The third major institutional innovation developed by MSSRF for transforming the rural economy is the computer-aided and internet connected Village Knowledge Centre.

The work undertaken by MSSRF in setting up community centered and managed Village Knowledge Centres (VKC) in Pondicherry villages since 1998 based on modern information and communication technologies (ICT) with financial support from IDRC of Canada has shown that ICT helps to improve the timeliness and efficiency of farm operations and enhances income through producer-oriented markets. Also, experience has shown that bridging the digital divide is a powerful method of bridging the gender divide. Knowledge connectivity therefore confers multiple economic and social benefits. The VKC operates on the principles of social inclusion and giving voice to the voiceless. The information provided, which includes location-specific data on entitlements to different Government schemes, is demand-driven and is in the local language. For example, in Union Territory of Pondicherry there are over 150 schemes designed to help the poor; yet nearly 20 per cent of families are below the poverty line. After the onset of the digital age, knowledge on entitlements and how to access them has grown rapidly. The VKC will be a powerful instrument for operationalising the provisions of the Right to Information Act (2005).

Encouraged by the ability of rural women and men to take to ICT like fish to water, MSSRF initiated in 2003, two major steps to take ICT to every one of the over 600,000 villages in India by 15 august, 2007, which marks the 60^th anniversary of ‘our tryst with destiny’, to quote Jawaharlal Nehru. The first is the organization of a National Alliance for Mission 2007: Every Village a Knowledge Centre which provides a platform for partnership to all committed to the cause of extending the power of ICT to rural India. The National Alliance has now over 150 members comprising Central and State Government agencies, business and industry, academia and non-governmental and mass media organizations.

The second is the establishment of the Jamsetji Tata National Virtual Academy for Rural Prosperity with generous support from the Tata Education Trust. The Internet — community radio combination is a powerful method of reaching the unreached in terms of delivery of dynamic information. Public policy in promoting the use of community radio should be based on the following principle enunciated by the Supreme Court in its judgment delivered in December1995, ‘Air waves constitute public property and must be used for advancing public good’. This is the same principle enshrined in the Dandi March movement of Mahatma Gandhi in relation to sea water, which is the basis of MSSRF’s programme on sea water farming for coastal area prosperity.

At a recent meeting held at MSSRF, Panchayati Raj leaders have assured that they will provide space, electricity and telephone connection for establishing VKCs in the Panchayat premises. Thus, all the 234676 Village Panchayats in 31 States and Union Territories as well as Traditional Councils in the N.E. States can be brought together under the umbrella of the National Alliance. A hub-spokes model will help to reach all villages from Panchayat VKCs. Such Centres can be operated by ICT-Self-help Groups of rural women and men. MSSRF is assisting NABARD to organize about 10000 ICT — SHGs in 10 States of the country during 2005-06,

Besides connectivity and content, capacity building is essential for ensuring local ownership of VKCs. This is where the Jamsetji Tata National Virtual Academy (NVA) of MSSRF hopes to play a key role. The President of India, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam inducted the first 137 Fellows of the NVA drawn from 15 States on 11 July 2005 at New Delhi. Microsoft is providing generous support for capacity building under its Unlimited Potential programme.

The Fellows of NVA are rural women and men who have studied up to the tenth class or up to the first degree. They serve as Master Trainers and undertake the training of other rural women and men as well as children. These grassroots academicians will be the torchbearers of the rural knowledge revolution. Another significant development in taking the benefits of the space age to the rural poor was the inauguration by the Prime Minister of India, Dr Manmohan Singh on 18 October 2004 of an ISRO–MSSRF joint initiative in setting up Village Resource Centres (VRCs) which can link rural families to the best available sources of knowledge in medicine and health care, education, agriculture, markets and government programmes. This programme which initially linked MSSRF (Chennai) to VRCs in Thiruvayaru, Sempatti and Thangachimadam in Tamil Nadu is being extended to Chidambaram, Pudukottai, Pondicherry, Nagapattinam and Kanyakumari during this year. With the help of the Indian Space Research Organisation, additional centers are being opened in Tsunami affected areas and in Farmers’ ‘distress hotspots’ in Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka. These are areas where suicides by farmers occur. Those operating the computer aided knowledge system at such Centres will be either wives or daughters or sons of those who were driven to take their lives. This will help to provide a sense of realism and urgency in achieving a match between content and the need to save livelihoods and lives. While VKC operates at the village level, the VRC is designed to cover a Block and thereby serve as a resource center for all the villages in the Block. The design of a VKC is on the lines shown in Fig. 6.

The Prime Minister of India has announced a well-funded Bharat Nirman programme to accelerate progress in providing urban amenities in rural areas and to bring an additional ten million hectares under assured irrigation. Knowledge connectivity should be the backbone of the Bharat Nirman programme, since it is fundamental to deriving maximum benefit, in terms of a better quality of life in villages, from the investment on roads, telephone connectivity and other forms of physical connectivity. The involvement of Panchayats and Gram Sabhas in providing the needed logistic and policy support will ensure the efficient functioning of VKCs. To begin with VKC should be tools of information, knowledge and skill empowerment of rural families, particularly of the economically and socially under privileged sections of the society. This is a fundamental responsibility of Government. Hence, the initial expenses should be met from the Bharat Nirman Programme and the Universal Service Obligation (USO) Fund. By the end of this decade (i.e., by 2010), the VKCs will become vibrant centers of economic activity and will provide opportunities for outsourcing of assignments from urban to rural areas. They will then become not only economically self-reliant but will help to create a wide range of skilled jobs for youth in villages. A VKC centred Bharat Nirman will be the most effective method of fostering rural and agrarian prosperity and arresting the unplanned migration of the rural poor to urban areas result­ing in the proliferation of urban slums. Therefore, knowledge connectivity through VKCs should be the corner stone of a New Deal for Rural India.

What motivates the scientists and scholars of MSSRF are the words of the Poet Rabindranath Tagore