Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology (IT) Ravi Shankar Prasad has urged start-ups to come up with new ideas and adopt 10-12 villages for digital education and digital health of the rural India.

Encouraging big start-up to think in-line with the government’s pacing National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) programme, the Union Minister informed that 2,10,000 kilometres of optical fibres have been laid since NDA government came to power in May of 2014, linking about 1 lakh gram panchayats to it.

“I would say by the middle of 2018, we are going to link (the rest). But my request to all of you is that if the optical fibre is already there, I want new start-ups to come up with new ideas, pick up 10-20 villages for digital education, for digital health,” said Prasad during a panel discussion at the ET Startup Awards 2017.

Addressed the bright Startup entrepreneurs at #ETStartupAwards. Urged them be active participants in building new India. pic.twitter.com/VZriHZW71I

— Ravi Shankar Prasad (@rsprasad) August 18, 2017

The government is planning to launch 1,000 digital villages by the end of 2017. These will be smart villages powered by a dynamic collector.

“I would urge all the big startups sitting here to think on that line. The idea is to have solar power, where I have requested Piyush Goyal to work closely with me. Then virtual classroom, virtual health room. That is how we are changing the whole digital infrastructure,” said the Minister.

Laying emphasis on the importance of Digital India, the IT Minister said that the ambitious programme is designed to bridge the digital divide between the “digital haves and have nots”, and hence digital inclusion is very important.