Second, ICT allows the government and civil society organisations (CSOs) to obtain, collate, store and analyse information in ways that improve decision-making and facilitate implementation of policies that improve the quality of life of the people at large and the disadvantaged in particular. This it can do by:

Finally, the government, CSOs and private agencies can use ICT to deliver a range of services such as agricultural extension services, health services, user charge collection services, provision of documents relating to land ownership rights delivered from computerised land records databases, and so on. This not only improves the efficiency of service delivery but also, in many instances, increases transparency in government-citizen transactions that help improve the quality and effectiveness of services delivered.

There are indeed many experiments under way in India that seek to use information and communications technology to improve the quality of life of the disadvantaged. One ongoing database compiled by IT for Change, a non-governmental organisation located in Bangalore, already includes around 150 such experiments and the actual number is likely to be much higher. While a few of these are relatively large in scale and some others have the potential for being scaled up from their current pilot status, most are of relatively recent origin and are yet to establish themselves as being viable and/or economically sustainable.

However, the realisation of the potential and direct human development gains from ICT requires, as noted earlier, the rather widespread diffusion of the technology through a vertical, multi-level process that delivers access to the technology to disadvantaged communities and individuals. Since connectivity is a core element of the new technology, a simple measure used to assess the degree of such diffusion is tele-density or the number of telephones per hundred inhabitants in the country. Going by that measure, there is evidence that suggests that India may be on track to realise the required degree of diffusion even if at a slow (but accelerating) pace. Recently released figures indicate that telephone density has touched 5 per 100 inhabitants as on March 31, 2003, compared with only 1.39 at the end of March 1994, when the shift to a new, more liberal telecom policy began. Since then the rate of expansion of connectivity has indeed been rapid, with tele-density touching 2.86 lines per 100 people on March 31, 2000, 3.64 on March 31, 2001, 4.4 on March 31, 2002 and five as on March 31, 2003 (Chart 1).

This growth in connectivity is expected to substantially increase interactive communication between distant centres, permit improved governance through the more efficient delivery of information and a range of social services in rural areas as well as expand access to the Internet and the benefits it can provide. Assuming that the Government is able to put in place the IT infrastructure needed to exploit the benefits of such connectivity, it is argued, the country seems to be well on its way to realising its goal of delivering IT to the masses, to supplement the benefits from the autonomous growth of IT-use in the urban areas epitomised by the burgeoning revenues from the `production' and export of IT-enabled and software services.

The difficulty is that a closer examination of the data suggests that aggregate tele-density may not be a good measure of the extent of diffusion. To start with, the aggregate figure conceals a high degree of urban concentration. Tele-density in rural India in 1999 was just 0.4 lines per 100 people. Rural tele-density, which crossed one per hundred in 2002, stood at 1.49 in 2003, when urban tele-density was placed at 15.49.

Further, inter-regional variations were also substantial. As on March 31, 2003, while total tele-density in the state of Delhi was 26.85, that in Bihar was as low as 1.32.

Besides the huge rural-urban divide and the substantial inter-regional variations in tele-density, the figures also appear to be substantially influenced by the recent growth of the mobile telephony sector. As of end-March 2002, while there were 37.9 million direct exchange lines (DELs) being provided by public sector companies and 0.50 million direct exchange lines by private operators, the number of cellular phone subscribers was placed at 6.4 million or close to 16 per cent of all DELs. Since a very large proportion of cellular phone subscribers were those who subscribed to the service in addition to holding a regular landline, so as to benefit from the mobility that cellular telephony allows, the rise in telephone density as a result of an increase in cellular telephone connections can hardly be taken as indicative of the diffusion of telecommunications technology among those who were thus far marginalised from the network.

To assess the latter, one needs separate indicators of mass access such as the presence of public call offices (PCOs) in rural and urban areas and direct exchange lines and village public telephones (VPTs) in rural areas. These indicators are by no means encouraging. The number of PCOs that could be converted into telecom kiosks or centres with Internet connectivity stood at just 10.6 lakh at the end of March 2002. This figure amounted to less than 3 per cent of the total number of DELs in the country.

Further, while the population in rural areas amounted to more than 70 per cent of the total, the number of rural DELs worked out to just 23.5 per cent of the total.

Finally, despite the Government's efforts to reach a telephone connection to each of India's 600,000 villages, the total number of village public telephones at the end of March 2002 amounted to 469,000. These figures are clearly indicative of a digital divide driven by asset and income inequalities, such that there a few at the top who are connected while the majority, preponderantly in rural areas, are marginalised from the communications network.

Even if connectivity in the form of a communications link is established, there is no guarantee that this can be viably expanded to connect India's villages to the world through the Internet, if that were considered a advantageous route to take. Despite its large population, the success of its IT industry and the Government's stated intent of wiring the villages, India today lags far behind many other developing countries in terms of the bandwidth (or the pipe) necessary for people to simultaneously access information flow through the Internet.

In 2001, the International Telecommunications Union estimated bandwidth availability in India at 1,475 megabits per second (Mbits/sec), as compared with 2,639 in Singapore, 5,432 in South Korea, 6,308 in Hong Kong and 7,598 in China (Chart 2).

This, however, was not a problem because Internet users in India were estimated in that year at just 0.7 per 100 inhabitants, compared with 2.6 in China, 36.3 in Singapore, 38.5 in Hong Kong and 52.1 in South Korea (Chart 3). Figures yielded by the National Readership Survey (NRS) 2002 indicated that there were only 6.6 million out of 680.6 million adults who had accessed the Internet in the preceding three months (Chart 4).

The nature of even this limited user group comes through from the pattern of usage revealed by NRS 2002. The figures indicate that, besides the urban concentration noted earlier, there is a high degree of geographical concentration even among urban Internet users. Close to one half of them (48.6 per cent) were located in the top eight metros, with smaller towns accounting for the remaining (Chart 5).

Interestingly, however, while towns with a population of more than 10 lakh and 5-10 lakh respectively accounted for 13.1 per cent and 8.5 per cent of Internet users respectively, those with populations of one-five lakh and less than one lakh were home to 18.8 per cent and 11 per cent respectively. That is, these are signs of some diffusion of Internet use among smaller Indian towns, providing a glimmer of hope to those who see in an opportunity in the new technology.

Such signs of diffusion at the "lower-end" of the user spectrum are visible elsewhere as well, as in the figures on the place of access (Chart 6). While 17.5 per cent of urban users accessed the Internet from their homes, 20.84 per cent had access from their place of work and another 12.7 per cent from their place of study. What is noteworthy was that a huge 40.56 per cent accessed the net through cyber-cafes. This lends credence to the view that the conversion of public call offices and STD/ISD booths that are indeed ubiquitous across India now, could help expand Internet use over time.

This picture of a combination of extreme concentration at the top accompanied by a more diffused access to the technology among users at the "lower-end" is supported by figures on the distribution of users in terms of hours of usage (Chart 7). Those who had used the Internet for five hours or more in a week accounted for 29.3 per cent of the total of Internet users, whereas those who used it for one hour or less accounted for as much as 40 per cent.

That is, there were a large number of users who were using the Net to a limited extent, principally for e-mail and restricted surfing. It is likely that this large chunk of low-frequency users belonging to the "lower-end" of the user spectrum restricted use to what were seen as absolutely necessary operations. That is, the Internet is not just concentrated among those who surf the Net for entertainment, besides information and communication. It shows signs of diffusion among those whose usage pattern suggests that their use is much more purposeful, even if limited in terms of time.

Thus, while the use of the new technology is indeed still extremely limited in India, and diffusion of the benefits of IT that can make a difference to the quality of life must wait, there are signs of change. Besides being concentrated among a set of top-end users, the technology does seem to be in the process of diffusion among a set of lower-end, low-frequency users.

This dual nature of the diffusion of the technology suggests that there are two routes through which the technology can impact on the quality of life. Elite users, who use the technology to share information and analysis in crucial areas such as the environment, health, corporate practices and labour conditions, can share information and debate, develop and contribute to creating international best-practice standards in the relevant area, which provide the basis for national policy and for mobilisation of public opinion nationally and internationally to change policy regimes. This would be the top-down, trickle-down means for the technology to influence human development.

The other would be for the technology to be diffused leading to use by, and participation of, the disadvantaged in the formulation and implementation of policies as well to the direct provision of improved services that affect the quality of their lives. This is the more democratic face of the technology and the best manner in which it can be used to advance human development goals.

Unfortunately, the current extent and pattern of diffusion of the technology in the country is such that it the first of these which overwhelmingly predominates and is likely to continue to do so in the foreseeable future.

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