How things have changed! A few decades ago, Indian ministers were seen as itinerants going around with a begging bowl for international aid while India’s growth rate was that of a tortoise.
How things have changed! A few decades ago, Indian ministers were seen as itinerants going around with a begging bowl for international aid while India’s growth rate was that of a tortoise. Today, the high-tech czars of Silicon Valley and CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are lining up for an Indian middle class of an estimated 400 million with purchasing power. However, they may find doing business with India not as easy as made out in meetings with top leaders of the nation.
For instance, Sundar Pichai, the PIO heading the search engine giant Google, has an ambitious idea of bringing the Internet down from balloons 20 km up in the sky to remote regions of rural India. He has even got in-principle clearance to start pilot tests of his “Project Loon” and will be collaborating with BSNL. Having got the nod despite objections from civil aviation regarding balloons possibly interfering with aircraft paths, the defence ministry regarding an eye in the sky over security installations and the communications ministry over spectrum in the range of the 700 to 900 MHz currently occupied by telecom companies, Pichai has achieved a breakthrough that would have taken anyone else years.
Serving the remotest areas of India with Internet from the sky is an exciting principle. Whether it is too risky from the security point of view needs to be answered. A solution could lie in the government collaborating actively with the project as a strategic partner. Apart from that, everything else that Google will be attempting in India is nearly altruistic. It is up to India to take advantage.
