IT Minister Invites Participation from Startups for Strengthening COVID Vaccine Intelligence Network (CoWIN) System

IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad announces launch of Grand Challenge for strengthening the COVID Vaccine Intelligence Network (CoWIN) system

CoWIN is a digitalised platform to be used to effectively roll out and scale up the mechanism for COVID Vaccine Distribution System, nationally

The challenge invites participation from innovative startups and emerging technology specialists to augment and scale the CoWIN platform

The participants may register at https://meitystartuphub.in from 23rd December 2020 to 15th January 2021

Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) along with Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has announced the launching of “CoWIN”, a Grand Challenge for strengthening the COVID Vaccine Intelligence Network (CoWIN) system, a digitalised platform to be used to effectively roll out and scale up the mechanism for COVID Vaccine Distribution System, nationally.

Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said “India‘s innovators have played a crucial role in our fight against COVID19. I invite innovators and startups for grand challenge to strengthen CoWIN platform for roll out of COVID19 vaccination program across India.”

To be launched on the MSH (MeitY Startup Hub) portal, a collaborative platform developed under the aegis of MeitY towards building meaningful synergies in the Indian tech startup space, the challenge invites participation from talented and innovative startups and emerging technology specialists to augment and scale the CoWIN platform. 

MoHFW has identified seven (07) focus areas of technology development to holistically address the likely limitations associated with complete and effective vaccine distribution system (VDS) and its seamless administration across India. These challenges try to broadly address the priority areas relating to infrastructure, monitoring and management, dynamic learning and information systems, constraints of human resources-including technical capacities, vaccine logistics management and tracking enlisted beneficiaries for any adverse event following immunization on real time basis.

The Challenge kickstarts with registration process at https://meitystartuphub.in on 23rd December 2020 and is open for participants to apply till 15th January 2021. 

The top 5 applicants will be provided the CoWIN APIs (Application Programming Interface) to prove the efficacy of their solutions for possible integration with the platform. 

Each shortlisted applicant at this stage stands a chance to win Rs. 2 Lakhs covering their logistical requirements. The solutions once integrated with the platform through open APIs will be assessed for robustness and scalability. 

Top 2 contestants from the challenge will be rewarded with Rs. 40 Lakh and 20 Lakh respectively post successful migrations of the developed solutions on the cloud on which the CoWIN is hosted, apart from their integration with CoWIN.

To Promote Large-Scale Electronics Manufacturing, Govt Formulating Scheme

The government is formulating a production linked incentive scheme to promote large-scale electronics manufacturing in segments including mobile phones and specified electronic components, Parliament was informed on Thursday.

Minister for Electronics and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad, in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha, said there has been no stagnation or slowdown in the electronics sector in the last two years.

A high-level committee under the chairmanship of CEO, Niti Aayog, comprising finance secretary, commerce secretary, secretary, Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT); secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) and senior adviser of Niti Aayog was constituted to deliberate and give recommendations on making India a manufacturing hub for electronics, he said.

"Based on the deliberations of the aforesaid high-level Committee and an inter-ministerial sub-committee constituted thereafter, a Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme is being formulated to promote large scale electronics manufacturing in target segments, namely, mobile phones and specified electronic components," Prasad said.

He said the government attaches high priority to electronics hardware manufacturing and it is an important pillar of both 'Make in India' and 'Digital India' programmes.

"As a result of several initiatives and pro-growth policies undertaken by the Government and efforts of the industry, India's electronics production has increased from Rs 1,90,366 crore in 2014-15 to Rs 4,58,006 crore in 2018-19, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of about 25 per cent," he said.

The domestic electronics manufacturing is on a growth path, he added. PTI MBI

Telecom Minister Ask the Industry to Focus on 5G Innovation in Health, Agriculture

Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Saturday exhorted the sector to make India a hub for telecom equipment manufacturing. Prasad said that India is on its way to become a global power with march of technology and asked the telecom industry to focus on innovation around 5G technology to create products with India specific patents.

He said that India generates huge amount of data and has a potential to emerge as global hub for data analysis, data innovation and data refinery while prioritising privacy.

"India must become a centre of telecom equipment manufacturing... low cost telecom products. COAI should be a partner," Prasad said at a curtain raiser event of India Mobile Congress.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) last year recommended for the formation of a unit within the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to promote the manufacture of domestic telecom equipment.

TRAI recommended the establishment of a Telecom Research and Development Fund (TRDF), with an initial corpus of Rs 1,000 crore. The fund should seek to promote research and innovation for the designing, manufacturing and testing domestic telecom equipment.

"I want mobile sector to ensure that start-ups should be encouraged more and more. So I want mobile sector to work in conjunction with start-ups," Prasad said. He asked the industry to come with innovative 5G products in areas like mobile, healthcare, agriculture and other sectors which have potential to reap its benefit.

Talking about digital data generated in India and gaining importance in the sector, Prasad said the government is coming up with robust data protection legislation and will not compromise on data sovereignty.

Industry body COAI at the event announced that the three day India Mobile Congress will be held between October 14-16, 2019.

Telecom Secretary Aruna Sundararajan said the number of exhibitors this time at the event is expected to be double the size of last year's. PTI PRS MBI

Indian Govt. Claims To Have Tool To Defeat iPhone Encryption

While the world is still going gaga over the FBI claiming to have cracked the code to hack the once security pious iPhone, the Indian government has dropped another big bomb on Apple.

According to a news piece published in a national daily, India's communications and IT minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad has said that India has a mobile forensics tool up its ante that is capable enough to handle smartphones, including Apple's iPhone.

For people keeping a close watch on tech news, might be already aware about the infamous FBI and Apple legal battle that took place earlier this year. The US government demanded the tech giant to help them get access to a locked iPhone 5C device apparently used by one of the two terrorists having a hand in the San Bernardino, California attack that took place in December leaving 14 people dead. The tech giant decided not to honour the government's request stating its policies and didn't budge from its decision even when a court order was sent to it. At the end, the FBI finally zeroed in on a third party person(s) to help them provide a hand in bypassing the iPhone's strong security.

In the year 2010, a similar case happened with the then famous Blackberry. The company faced a hard time when India and other countries demanded on having an access to the encrypted customer data stored on the com servers. According to a statement by the company then, it could not provide access to the data, as it does not possess the encryption keys.

Majority of the technology firms believe that weakening encryption, which involves scrambling the data so that it can be read and accessed by the intended person, directly violates the privacy of the device owners. On the other hand, Law enforcement officials counter the their claim by stating that encryption hinders their ability to access data in criminal investigations.

While who is right and who is wrong, is something which we surely can't assess, but the only way to deal with the situation at hand, is to find a middle way to work through it, instead of getting into frivolous legal battles.

[Top Image - simone mescolini / Shutterstock.com]

Government To Launch A Website For Innovators In India Seeking Govt. Help

Yesterday, IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said at the Intel DST Innovate for Digital India Challenge that the Government will set up a dedicated website for innovators in India seeking government help to transform their ideas into reality.

"I have decided that there will be a separate, dedicated portal of my ministry dedicated to the innovators of India," IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said at the Intel DST Innovate for Digital India Challenge event in Delhi.

Hailing "jugaad", or the frugal innovation India has come to be known for in the course of its development, Prasad said the government plans to double the number of Common Service Centres (CSC) or information and communication technology (ICT) access points created under the National e-Governance Project.

Notably, under government's India Innovation Growth Programme there's already a website (since 2014) called IndiaInnovates.in which is a joint initiative of the Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India; Lockheed Martin Corporation; Indo-US Science and Technology Forum, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI); Stanford Graduate School of Business and the IC2 Institute at the University of Texas.

The website (IndiaInnovates.in) allows innovators in India to submit their innovations and expression of interest. The aim of India Innovation Growth Programme is to accelerate innovative Indian technologies into the global markets.

The minister, this time, however announced a different website from this one and it would be interesting to how the newly announced website and government's plan is different from what is already existing one and all it requires is little push and efficacy.

"We propose to double the number of Common Service Centres that number 126,000," the minister said in yesterday's

"There is a plan to convert the existing 125,000 post offices across the country into common service centres," he said.

"Frugal innovation along with government support will result in the turning of India," he added.

The purpose of the CSC project is to provide much-needed information and services to under served Indians in rural areas.

Speaking earlier at the event, senior vice-president of Intel Corporation Gregory R. Pearson said: “The Intel mission is to use the power of Moore's Law to bring smart connected devices to every person on earth.”

"Besides the democratisation brought on by digital, now it has also become affordable," he added.

IAMAI To Identify Objectionable Content On Internet

The government of India has trusted Industry body IAMAI with the task of identifying objectionable content on the net in India. The same was informed to Parliament by Ravi Shankar Prasad, Telecom Minister on Friday.

Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), which is an association of content providers, has been bestowed upon with the task of making a list of objectionable websites, particularly porn sites, available on the net.

The websites included in the list by IAMAI will then be considered for disabling.

The top ranks at the Industry body IAMAI are currently held by the Indian heads of leading international internet giants.

Rajan Anandan, Managing Director, Google India, is the Chairman of IAMAI, while Kirthiga Reddy, India Chief, Facebook, is the Vice Chairman of the industry body.

According to Prasad, currently, the government doesn’t have any proposal to formulate a policy to censor content on the net.

“Government takes action, whenever sites/URL pages with objectionable contents infringing any law of the country are brought to its notice by law enforcement agencies, or when court issues direction to block any URL of websites,” said Prasad in Rajya Sabha.

Prasad had informed the Lok Sabha on Wednesday that the Modi government had blocked 32 websites, including web-pages, in November last year. The request for the same was sent by the Anti-Terrorism squad of Mumbai and was accompanied by a court order.

According to the Anti-Terrorism Squad, the 32 blocked web pages and websites were being used to promote "jihadi" propaganda and for luring Indian youth into joining "jihadi" activities and ISIS.

All these blocked websites and web pages were later unblocked after their owners guaranteed to comply with the law and its rules and also follow consultation with the Anti-terrorism squad.

As per the official information shared in the Lok Sabha, the owners of these blocked websites took the help of the social media website Twitter to respond to the government’s ban and assured work within the law.

IAMAI To Identify Objectionable Content On Internet

The government of India has trusted Industry body IAMAI with the task of identifying objectionable content on the net in India. The same was informed to Parliament by Ravi Shankar Prasad, Telecom Minister on Friday.

Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), which is an association of content providers, has been bestowed upon with the task of making a list of objectionable websites, particularly porn sites, available on the net.

The websites included in the list by IAMAI will then be considered for disabling.

The top ranks at the Industry body IAMAI are currently held by the Indian heads of leading international internet giants.

Rajan Anandan, Managing Director, Google India, is the Chairman of IAMAI, while Kirthiga Reddy, India Chief, Facebook, is the Vice Chairman of the industry body.

According to Prasad, currently, the government doesn’t have any proposal to formulate a policy to censor content on the net.

“Government takes action, whenever sites/URL pages with objectionable contents infringing any law of the country are brought to its notice by law enforcement agencies, or when court issues direction to block any URL of websites,” said Prasad in Rajya Sabha.

Prasad had informed the Lok Sabha on Wednesday that the Modi government had blocked 32 websites, including web-pages, in November last year. The request for the same was sent by the Anti-Terrorism squad of Mumbai and was accompanied by a court order.

According to the Anti-Terrorism Squad, the 32 blocked web pages and websites were being used to promote "jihadi" propaganda and for luring Indian youth into joining "jihadi" activities and ISIS.

All these blocked websites and web pages were later unblocked after their owners guaranteed to comply with the law and its rules and also follow consultation with the Anti-terrorism squad.

As per the official information shared in the Lok Sabha, the owners of these blocked websites took the help of the social media website Twitter to respond to the government’s ban and assured work within the law.

Bihar Startups to Rejoice - STPI To Set Up New Incubation Facility In Patna Worth 10 Crore

Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) is all set to set up a brand new incubation facility in Patna with an investment of whopping ten Crores in order to meet the needs of the Information Technology industry and promote young entrepreneurs.

According to the plan, the new incubation facility can be expected to be operational within eighteen months. The facility will result in the creation of indirect and direct employment in Patna region.

The foundation stone of the new incubation facility was laid down by the IT and Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on November 8^th, 2014.

According to a statement released by STPI, an organization under the Department of Electronics & Information Technology, the organization has been bestowed upon the duty to set up the new incubation facility that will cater to the needs of young entrepreneurs and their startups. The new facility will reportedly be 8,000 sq ft in size and require an investment of ten crores.

The incubation facility will also double up as a resource centre for IT/ITeS exporting units. It will offer them infrastructural facilities like high speed data communication with uninterrupted data connectivity and other things required for the export and development of software and services.

The facility will also be put in use for one of the programmes under the PM’s Digital India initiative, which involves indigenous production of software and IT hardware for exports and supports software product based startups.

The Software Technology Parks of India was set up in 1991 by the Ministry of Communications and IT in order to promote IT/ITeS exports from the country.  Exports by STP units have seen a tremendous growth from a mere Rs. 52 crore in the year 1992-93 to a whopping Rs. 2.73 lakh crore in 2013-14. Out of the total 53 STP centres in the country, 46 are located in tier-II and tier-III locations.

The Patna facility was established by STPI long back in 2008. The STPI has created 11,500 sq ft of hi-tech space in three acres of campus at Pataliputra Industrial area.  In the year 2013-14, the cumulative exports of the region stood at Rs 35 crore, while the software exports stood at Rs. 10 crore.

Bihar Startups to Rejoice - STPI To Set Up New Incubation Facility In Patna Worth 10 Crore

Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) is all set to set up a brand new incubation facility in Patna with an investment of whopping ten Crores in order to meet the needs of the Information Technology industry and promote young entrepreneurs.

According to the plan, the new incubation facility can be expected to be operational within eighteen months. The facility will result in the creation of indirect and direct employment in Patna region.

The foundation stone of the new incubation facility was laid down by the IT and Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on November 8^th, 2014.

According to a statement released by STPI, an organization under the Department of Electronics & Information Technology, the organization has been bestowed upon the duty to set up the new incubation facility that will cater to the needs of young entrepreneurs and their startups. The new facility will reportedly be 8,000 sq ft in size and require an investment of ten crores.

The incubation facility will also double up as a resource centre for IT/ITeS exporting units. It will offer them infrastructural facilities like high speed data communication with uninterrupted data connectivity and other things required for the export and development of software and services.

The facility will also be put in use for one of the programmes under the PM’s Digital India initiative, which involves indigenous production of software and IT hardware for exports and supports software product based startups.

The Software Technology Parks of India was set up in 1991 by the Ministry of Communications and IT in order to promote IT/ITeS exports from the country.  Exports by STP units have seen a tremendous growth from a mere Rs. 52 crore in the year 1992-93 to a whopping Rs. 2.73 lakh crore in 2013-14. Out of the total 53 STP centres in the country, 46 are located in tier-II and tier-III locations.

The Patna facility was established by STPI long back in 2008. The STPI has created 11,500 sq ft of hi-tech space in three acres of campus at Pataliputra Industrial area.  In the year 2013-14, the cumulative exports of the region stood at Rs 35 crore, while the software exports stood at Rs. 10 crore.

Bizarre, Indian Govt. wants IT revolution by launching eGreetings portal

The government's IT wing is doing odd things in the name of digitization and IT revolution, yesterday Ravi Shankar Prasad, Communication and IT Minister of India, unveiled the egreetings.india.gov.in portal yesterday as a part of the new government's Digital India initiative. The eGreetings portal has an aim of propagating eco-friendly ways of sending greetings by government officials and ministers to friends and colleagues.

The portal which looked like a retarded portal of 90's era was unveiled on the eve of the country's 68^th Independence Day celebrations. Govt. claimed that it houses a grand collection of designs made by people from all over the country.

At the launch, the Communication and IT Minister lauded the efforts of the IT department and its officials for coming up with such a novel idea of having this kind of IT greeting card, as if they have invented ground-breaking internet technology by developing egreetings portal.

Although there are plenty of e-greetings portal in the country, the objectives of launch of such portal and that's too by govt. is unclear, instead they could have made a portal where the reports of all inquiry comissions on incidence such as communal riots, corruption charges etc. are available for public view and this is kind of portal could have been example of good digital transparency initiative by new govt. However they chose making egreeting portal which gives impression of very childish thoughts of new govt. and doing formalities on the name of digitization.

According to Prasad, this initiative by the IT department is in agreement with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s commitment to ensure a proper IT revolution in the country followed by connectivity. On a second thought a large area of Indian geography is still untouched with basic internet connection, dont' know how come govt. IT department bring out IT revolution by launching egreeting portal.

Advice to IT minister - An IT revolution comes in any nation by strengthening its internet connectivity in both rural and urban areas and building broadband infrastructure and cheap computer peripherals and not by launching egreetings portal, what would 60% of Indian population will do with egreetings portal when they dont even have basic internet connection nor the computer to operate from.

IT minister Prasad also said that, enhancing Internet connectivity by launching the eGreetings portal on 15^th August was a great idea and by cooperation of the citizens of the country through crowd sourcing, this could prove to be a huge success.

Prasad further hoped that the portal will not only be used by government officials and ministers but also by the people of the country although there are plenty of egreetings portals in the country already don't know why would common people will choose govt. egreetings portal which doesn't look good in comparison to existing egreetings portal.

According to R S Sharma, who is the Secretary of the Department of Electronics and Information Technology, the department had received 3,572 entries in total for the greeting card designs and out of these entries, the best 14 were selected. The Department of Electronics and Information Technology has made six greeting cards in total.

All the selected 14 entries will be awarded by the department. They would be given a cash prize so as to encourage more and more people to make designs for the portal.

The eGreetings portal also provides the option of selecting a quote of Prime Minster Narendra Modi which would then be sent as a part of the greeting.

In order to use the portal, the user is required to be a registered user of MyGov platform or the government’s email service or the India Gov platform.

The NaMo government has a plan of spending around 5000 crore this fiscal under the Digital India initiative, bizarre isn't it ?, if 5000 crore of money will be spending on craps like egreetings portals only God can clarify that will this bring our IT revolution or utter waste of money.A question arises does a egreetings portal needed that badly by Indian public.

Bizarre, Indian Govt. wants IT revolution by launching eGreetings portal

The government's IT wing is doing odd things in the name of digitization and IT revolution, yesterday Ravi Shankar Prasad, Communication and IT Minister of India, unveiled the egreetings.india.gov.in portal yesterday as a part of the new government's Digital India initiative. The eGreetings portal has an aim of propagating eco-friendly ways of sending greetings by government officials and ministers to friends and colleagues.

The portal which looked like a retarded portal of 90's era was unveiled on the eve of the country's 68^th Independence Day celebrations. Govt. claimed that it houses a grand collection of designs made by people from all over the country.

At the launch, the Communication and IT Minister lauded the efforts of the IT department and its officials for coming up with such a novel idea of having this kind of IT greeting card, as if they have invented ground-breaking internet technology by developing egreetings portal.

Although there are plenty of e-greetings portal in the country, the objectives of launch of such portal and that's too by govt. is unclear, instead they could have made a portal where the reports of all inquiry comissions on incidence such as communal riots, corruption charges etc. are available for public view and this is kind of portal could have been example of good digital transparency initiative by new govt. However they chose making egreeting portal which gives impression of very childish thoughts of new govt. and doing formalities on the name of digitization.

According to Prasad, this initiative by the IT department is in agreement with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s commitment to ensure a proper IT revolution in the country followed by connectivity. On a second thought a large area of Indian geography is still untouched with basic internet connection, dont' know how come govt. IT department bring out IT revolution by launching egreeting portal.

Advice to IT minister - An IT revolution comes in any nation by strengthening its internet connectivity in both rural and urban areas and building broadband infrastructure and cheap computer peripherals and not by launching egreetings portal, what would 60% of Indian population will do with egreetings portal when they dont even have basic internet connection nor the computer to operate from.

IT minister Prasad also said that, enhancing Internet connectivity by launching the eGreetings portal on 15^th August was a great idea and by cooperation of the citizens of the country through crowd sourcing, this could prove to be a huge success.

Prasad further hoped that the portal will not only be used by government officials and ministers but also by the people of the country although there are plenty of egreetings portals in the country already don't know why would common people will choose govt. egreetings portal which doesn't look good in comparison to existing egreetings portal.

According to R S Sharma, who is the Secretary of the Department of Electronics and Information Technology, the department had received 3,572 entries in total for the greeting card designs and out of these entries, the best 14 were selected. The Department of Electronics and Information Technology has made six greeting cards in total.

All the selected 14 entries will be awarded by the department. They would be given a cash prize so as to encourage more and more people to make designs for the portal.

The eGreetings portal also provides the option of selecting a quote of Prime Minster Narendra Modi which would then be sent as a part of the greeting.

In order to use the portal, the user is required to be a registered user of MyGov platform or the government’s email service or the India Gov platform.

The NaMo government has a plan of spending around 5000 crore this fiscal under the Digital India initiative, bizarre isn't it ?, if 5000 crore of money will be spending on craps like egreetings portals only God can clarify that will this bring our IT revolution or utter waste of money.A question arises does a egreetings portal needed that badly by Indian public.