The State Convention of Democratic Alliance for Knowledge Freedom held here on Saturday demanded the redesign of the Digital India project.
The convention says the current form of the project will only lead to flow of money outside the country. It also asked the Central and State governments to declare a comprehensive data policy. Regarding Digital India, the convention said none of the promises had been implemented, even as the things progressed in the direction opposite to that envisaged.
“Right now, 95% of the transactions are cash-based. In a scenario of 100% digital transactions, ₹80 lakh crore will be transacted this way. With 2% imposed as banking charges, this alone will come to ₹1.6 lakh crores. With foreign direct investment in the banking sector now at 49%, half of this amount will go overseas,” said the resolution.
For successful implementation of Digital India, the country needs 25 times of the existing infrastructure. Though the Central government had promised lakhs of jobs and domestic production in the sector during the Digital India Week, the imports continued. No jobs were created, while companies with majority foreign ownership made huge profits.
“In this scenario, it is important to redesign Digital India project by starting production units of mobile phones, mother boards and chipsets, ensuring advanced connectivity, and generating adequate jobs,” said the resolution.
Regarding the comprehensive data policy, the convention demanded the creation of a system where the private data of individuals were protected and the ‘big data’ generated from various sources was used for the betterment of the society as a whole, rather than for the profit motives of corporates.
“Though large amount of big data is being generated, all of this is used without any controls for generating profits for corporates, who gather even minute information about personal tastes with no respect for privacy. Even government schemes like Aadhar use data in such a way, linking personal data to the databases of private companies. The governments at the State and Centre have to evolve a policy to use this big data in a responsible way,” said the resolution.
Another resolution was regarding the implementation of free software in all government offices in mission mode. If free software exists for the existing proprietary software, it should be replaced. A detailed list of the kind of softwares needed for each office should be prepared, the resolution said. Also, government employees should be trained in the use of free software.
