Digital India is an umbrella initiative which aims to transform India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.

Digital India

The Digital India Mission was launched by the PM in 2015. It is mainly focused on three areas:

1. Providing digital infrastructure as a source of utility to every citizen.
2. Governance and services on demand.
3. To look after the digital empowerment of every citizen.

Digital India was established with a vision of inclusive growth in areas of electronic services, products, manufacturing, and job opportunities.

Digital India aims to provide the much-needed thrust to the nine pillars of growth areas. Each of these areas is a complex programme in itself and cuts across multiple Ministries and Departments.

The nine pillars of Digital India are:

1. Broadband Highways– This covers three sub components, namely Broadband for All – Rural, Broadband for All – Urban and National Information Infrastructure (NII).
2. Universal Access to Mobile Connectivity- This initiative focuses on network penetration and filling the gaps in connectivity in the country.
3. Public Internet Access Programme- The two sub components of Public Internet Access Programme are Common Services Centres (CSCs) and Post Offices as multi-service centres.
4. e-Governance: (Reforming Government through Technology) Re-engineering using IT to simplify and make the government processes more efficient is critical for transformation to make the delivery of government services more effective across various government domains and therefore needs to be implemented by all Ministries/ Departments.
5. e-Kranti – Electronic Delivery of Services- To improve the delivery of public services and simplify the process of accessing them. In this regard, several e-governance initiatives have been undertaken by various State Governments and Central Ministries to usher in an era of e-Government. e-Governance in India has steadily evolved from the computerization of Government Departments to initiatives that encapsulate the finer points of Governance, such as citizen centricity, service orientation and transparency.
6. Information for All– This pillar aims to ensure transparency and availability of reliable data generated by the line ministries for use, reuse and redistribution for the people of India.
7. Electronics Manufacturing- This pillar focuses on promoting electronics manufacturing in the country.
8. IT for Jobs- This pillar focuses on providing training to the youth in the skills required for availing employment opportunities in the IT/ITES sector.
9. Early Harvest Programmes- This pillar consists of a group of different short-term projects which have immediate effect on the Indian digital ecosystem like IT platform for mass messaging, crowd sourcing of eGreetings, biometric attendance in the government offices, WI-FI in all universities etc.

Challenges faced by cyber security.

1. Lack of architecture for Cybersecurity: There is a lack of unified efforts to secure Critical Infrastructure of the public as well as the private sphere. This reduces the capability of security architecture to assess threats and tackle them effectively, in a coordinated manner.
2. Shortage of trained workforce: Although India is rife with a young workforce with considerable IT prowess, there is a dearth of talent when it comes to specific niches, such as Cyber Security. The demand for talented and skilled labour far outgrows supply.
3. Lack of high-end secured devices: Lack of mobile phones with higher security norms.
4. Imported hardware may increase cyber threats: Most equipment and technology for setting up Cyber Security infrastructure in are currently procured from global sources and their embedded softwares may increase the cyber security threats.
5. Lack of awareness: There is a lack of awareness about cyber fraud, cyber laws and regulations at both corporate levels as well as individual levels.

India’s future economic prospects depend very much on cyber security. Thus, it is imperative that we take the necessary steps to make India’s cyberspace safe and secured with expertise in cybersecurity.