150 million Indians connected to the web: Big Tent Activate Summit - MediaMughals

March 22, 2013 Source: MM Network By: Rashi Verma    Print   Email The Big Tent Activate event that was held at Taj Palace, New Delhi yesterday witnessed the presence of dignitaries and industry stakeholders from all different platforms. With dignitaries from political circle like Sam Pitroda, Kapil Sibal, Shashi Tharoor, Omar Abdullah, Narendra Modi on Google Hangout to Shekhar Kapoor , Shantanu Moitra from the entertainment wing to journalist and the digital media stakeholders. With industry stalwarts like the Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt, Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger ,Stephanie Cutter, the lady behind the Obama's digital election campaign, big bosses from several fields were present to discussion on the "Internet's Growth in various sectors in India" and its impact on economy, politics, society and culture. With the progress of discussion and thought provoking debate several facts and figures pertaining to the internet industrywere revealed as follows  • 150 million Indians connected to the web •  12% of the entire population is connected •  10 million households have broadband connectivity •  100 million mobile connected users •  less than 10 million are connected on 3G With several discussions the analysis arrived was, India lacks broadband network, hence the need of the hour is to improve the technology base and infrastructure. It has been predicted that by 2020 India will have more than 600 million people online. With 600 million connected people in India, the Internet will be twice the size of the number of users in the United States. What is required to get the next 300 million and 500 million Indians online? As per Anu Madgavkar, senior fellow, McKinsey Global Institute and the Mckinsey Report, the GDP growth rate in India has essentially halved over the last three years, from over 9% to around 4.5%, and what we have to do is figure out how to get the growth back to 7% or 8% plus. Internet today accounts for about 1.8% of GDP growth in India. If we can get this right and build out the right Internet infrastructure to enable growth in businesses, then the Internet could account for as much as 5% of GDP growth by 2020.   Approximately 2.5 Lakh gram panchayats will soon be connected through fibre optics , 1.5Lakh post-offices to be connected electronically soon. These figures when achieved would surely make India to be a country with robust public infrastructure ever known to anybody. The basic need of the hour is to work on the infrastructure which also includes educating the current and coming generations. Teacher today should not be the creator and deliverer of the content rather they have to be the mentors. India simply cannot produce enough high quality teachers to be able to educate at world class levels the 300 million plus students that we have. Today we have a medium that enables different political parties and politicians to directly engage with 150 million Indians at this point. Hence the government should stop trying to control the Internet, instead concentrate on ensuring the technology is used for the benefits of the common masses and local business. via Technology - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNHnK7onKhZq0kzFZiMhRAR71z8mDg&url=http://www.mediamughals.com/News/1/4/Article/11783/150_million_Indians_connected_to_the_web:_Big_Tent_Activate_Summit.htm

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