Dr Deepak B Phatak Subrao Nilekani Chair Professor Kanwal Rekhi School of Information Technology IIT Bombay

1. IT Roadmap for India
Dr Deepak B Phatak
Subrao Nilekani Chair Professor
Kanwal Rekhi School of Information Technology
IIT Bombay
Department of Information Technology
New Delhi, 17 July 2003

2. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 2
Overview
 The Pervasive nature of IT
 Indian Expectations
–A Teacher’s Dream
 Some Thoughts on Open Source
 Key Drivers for IT Penetration
 Efforts at KReSIT, IIT Bombay
 A Roadmap for Government
 Concluding Remarks

3. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 3
Information Technology
Technology that helps one or
more of the information
handling activities to be carried
out conveniently and efficiently
–Data capture, validation, storage,
retrieval, computations, analysis,
consolidation, reporting,
dissemination, and archival

4. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 4
Criticality
 Information management is critical
–Not technology!
 Efficient information systems are
important
–Effectiveness and competitiveness
depends upon these
 Modern ICT (Information and
communication technologies) must
be exploited to the hilt

5. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 5
Components of IT Deployment
Hardware
–Servers, PCs, Printers, PDA, …
System Software
–OS, RDBMS, Utilities, RAD Tools,…
Application Software
–Packaged, Turnkey Development
The only component that actually
implements desired functionality

6. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 6
Components …
Network
–Switches, Routers, Modems,
–Bandwidth
»Availability, Reliability, Affordability
Infrastructure
–Power, Furniture, DR Sites
People and Processes

7. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 7
Indian Expectations
Use ICT effectively to
–Provide comfortable life
–Increase competitiveness
–generate wealth and strength
Ensure IT usage by every Indian
(1000 Million People)

8. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 8
IT Penetration
Common measures of usage
–Extent of deployment
–Number of activities for which IT is
used and Level of IT usage
Extent of deployment often
measured by number of Access
Points to useful applications

9. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 9
IT Penetration …
Number of (connected) PCs
First 500 M users from West
–Numbers are saturating
Next 500 M users will be from
Asia, Africa, South America
–Rajesh Jain (emergic.org)

10. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 10
IT Penetration …
Indian usage levels
–5.8 PCs per 1000
–7 Million Internet users
Chinese usage levels
–19 PCs per 1000
–37 Million Internet users

11. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 11
A Teacher’s Dream
 Next 100 Million IT Users Should be
from India in five years
–In 2001, 1.6 M Desktops (only) sold at
Average (H/W) Price of Rs. 30000
–In 2002, 2.2 M (only)
 We need to deploy 20 M per year
–Quadruple the Investment
–Reduce TCO to One Fourth
»From Rs 40000 to Rs 10000

12. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 12
Server Centric Computing
 Deployment of applications happens
around database servers connected
to clients
–Client-server paradigm evolved
originally to uses power of PC
»Server Rs:2000000, PC: Rs 65000
(Now server: 200000, PC: 40000)
 Thin Clients must be deployed

13. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 13
Use Open Source Software (OSS)
 Operating System (Linux)
 Databases (MySQL, PostgreSQL)
 J2EE (JBOSS)
 Middleware (Open source MQ)
 …
 Established products and Apps.
available on Open Source

14. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 14
Some Thoughts on OSS
 The IPR Spectrum
 Software will always exist across
this entire spectrum
Free Open Semi-Open Protected
Software Source APIs Products
Richard Stallman Commercial
Companies

15. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 15
Some More Thoughts …
Developers Do Not Generally
Develop Applications on OSS
–Fear of Unacceptability
–Lack of Trained Staff
Users Not Enthusiastic
–Fear of Non-Support
–Scalability and Performance Issues

16. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 16
Key Drivers for IT Penetration
(Think Tank Meeting in Delhi - Skoch)
 Affordable Solutions
–Thin Client Model, Special Devices
–Increased use of Open Source
 Strengthening Indian Players
»… Indian Hardware Story
(Rational Expectations in BS by Sunil Jain)

17. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 17
Key Drivers …
Educating the Users
–For affordable and greater usage
IT in academics
–IT education
–IT in education
»F C Kohli’s initiative
»School usage – Dileep Lanjekar
Local Support, Entrepreneurship

18. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 18
Key Drivers
Government Initiatives
–Policies
–Duty / Tax structures
–Internal usage
»Replicable e-governance projects
Anti Piracy Drive
–Lax Indian standards on “IPR theft”

19. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 19
ABOUT KReSIT
 Established In October 1998
 Funding Support From Kanwal
Rekhi And Nandan Nilekani
–New Building, State-of-art Labs
 Programs From July 1999
–M Tech And Ph D Programs, PGDIIT
 Committed to Applied Research

20. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 20
NEW INITIATIVES
IT Business Incubator
–To Promote Indian Start-Ups
–New Technologies And Products
Distance Education
–High Quality IT Education To Large
Number Of Working Professionals,
Teachers and Students

21. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 21
The Affordable Solutions Lab
Build Solution Prototypes with
Minimum TCO
–Focus on Server Centric Solutions
–Browser Based Front-End
–Heavy Usage of OSS
Hopes to Set up All India Forum
–Cathedral for the Bazzar!

22. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 22
Affordable Lab …
Supported by TCS
Number of Partners
–Rajesh Jain’s Emergic Solutions
»Started Using Old PCs
–Via Technologies for Clients
–Intel For Servers
–More in offing:HCL, IBM, Oracle, …

23. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 23
Some Experiments
 Proof of Concept for
–Maharashtra Police
–LIC, SBI
–Cooperative bank software
 Affordable Web
–for Schools and Colleges
–Cache the ‘Free’ Knowledge on Web
and Distribute Through CD’s
(Gutenberg Project)

24. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 24
Emerging Price Points
160 GB IDE Disk: Rs 6000
Mother board: 4500
Flash chip: Rs 75 fro 32MB
Person-month varies from: Rs
35000 to Rs 150000
Software Licenses costlier

25. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 25
IT Projects in Government
Greater Movement to Adopt
Modern IT
–Several Successful Projects
Major Stumbling Blocks
–Limited Funds for IT
–Slow Project Implementation

26. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 26
Roadmap for Government
 Reduce duties to bring the price
point below “Psychic-threshold”
–Excise, CVD, …
 Promote Indian Brands
–Indian = MNC
 Open up Specifications
–Specify product features, not brand
names (Intel Pentium, Microsoft
Windows, …)

27. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay IT Roadmap for India 27
Roadmap for Government
Avoid confusion
–The CAS imbroglio
Use PKI/Smart cards for security
Release IPR on base technology
–Indian Language Fonts (CDAC)
–E-learning platforms and tools

28. Dr Deepak B Phatak, IIT Bombay Dear Teacher 28
AN UNSOLICITED ADVICE
Get Out of “Colonial Mindset”,
The World is ours to make a Mark on.
In our move towards a developed
nation, to provide an honorable and
comfortable life to Indian citizens,
and to live in the world as equals,
Help IT Penetration