United Villages, an American low cost ISP has applied to the Indian government to set up shop in India, and provide Internet services to rural India at an annual cost of about Rs.50/person.
The system involved works on similar principles to a post office or an elaborate "Sneaker Net". A central node [post office] is set up and connected to the Internet using any means available (satellite for really remote areas). This node services a certain number of villages around it. Each day, an employee (postman) rides out from the centre on a bicycle or moped (where available) and makes a circuit of each village serviced by the central node. The two wheeler is outfitted with a hardy WiFi enabled computer (which incidentally is not connected to the central node while on the road).
Each village in the service area has a self-sufficient Internet kiosk with one computer usually powered by a solar panel. While the kiosk is WiFi enabled, it is never connected directly to the Internet in any manner at any time.
When the two wheeler (postman) reaches the village, the kiosk computer and the computer on the vehicle make contact. The kiosk computer transfers all pending emails and any voice/video files (allowing for illiterate villagers) to the computer on the two wheeler, and downloads any data addressed to its users. It simultaneously downloads cached web pages allowing for offline browsing of resources on the Internet useful to the village.
The same process is repeated in all villages covered. When the two wheeler returns to the central node, any emails etc. that need to be sent are sent and any new data to be received is downloaded for the next day. Thus, thousands of isolated users can communicate with the rest of the planet at a very minimal cost.
In India, this has been successfully tested in both rural Haryana and Karnataka. It has also been successfully implemented in Cambodia, Rwanda and Costa Rica among others.
Further reading: Times of India; First Mile Solutions.
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Comments
Nice story. I hope that this
Nice story. I hope that this is approved and takes off. I'd much rather see the government investing in meaningful projects like this rather than providing "biometric systems" for primary schools. That (biometric system) is wrong on so many levels, it makes me cringe :/
Ugh.
Karthik.
lol! Finger print access for
lol! Finger print access for primary schools when a good percentage of the country doesn't have access to the most basic of amenities.. I guess we don't know how much the government is spending on this, but I doubt if Intel and whoever are giving this away for free..
And I don't know how they are able to pass this off an an egovernance initiative ffs..
Anyways, back on topic, I hope this takes off too, and I sincerely hope that the government doesn't do anything except provide financial aid if possible.
Din