PM Modi at Silicon Valley Meet, talks about ‘Digital India’

A gathering of top tech CEOs was addressed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi today in an effort to take forward the Digital India initiative. Prime Minister Modi said, “California is one of the last places in the world to see the sun set. But, it is here that new ideas see the first light of the day”, as he addressed a huge crowd at the Silicon Valley. He was joined by top CEOs of Silicon Valley including Google’s Sundar Pichai, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Cisco’s John Chambers, Qualcomm’s Paul Jacobs and Adobe’s Shantanu Narayan. Fairmont Hotel’s ballroom was packed with top executives and the event began with a presentation regarding Digital India. PM Modi also met Apple CEO Tim Cook and Elon Musk of Tesla Motors. While talking about social media, Pm touched matters of Internet of Things and Green energy. He said, “Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, they are the new neighborhoods of our new world… The most fundamental debate for our youth is the choice between Android, iOS or Windows. The pace at which people are taking to digital technology defies our stereotypes of age, education, language and income. In this digital age, we have an opportunity to transform lives of people in ways that was hard to imagine just a couple of decades ago.”

PM said that the transformation through Digital India will be like none in the history. The vision is to provide broadband connectivity to all schools and colleges by expanding the National Optical Fibre network to 600,000 villages. He announced plan for WiFi connectivity for 500 railway stations in collaboration with Google.

Sundar Pichai said that under Modi’s effort, India is next to becoming an innovation hotspot. He said, “It is not just about being online, but what you do online. India is the fastest growing startup economy in the world. They are not just Indian success stories, but global success stories.”

Taking the event further PM Modi promised to make the government more transparent, accessible, participative and accountable and assured people of data security and privacy. He said with the progressing economy it becomes very important to focus of data security and privacy as well as cyber security. He said increasing E-Governance facilities will make it all more economical, effective and efficient. He said, “It puts governance within everyone’s reach.”

Mr. Modi said that the Digital India initiative is the result of thought of transforming millions of poor lives rapidly. He said the government wants to eliminate all the excessive paper work from offices. He added, “We want paperless transactions. We will set up a digital locker for every citizen to store personal documents that can be shared across departments.”

PM Modi said that around 170 applications using Internet and Space technology can make governance faster and efficient. “So, from creating infrastructure to services, from manufacture of products to human resource development, from support governments to enabling citizens and promoting digital literacy, Digital India is a vast cyber world of opportunities for you,” PM added. He said to make this vision come true the government must also do some corporate thinking.

Image Source: Indian Express