Aakash 2 project aimed at democratising technology

The Centre said "Aakash 2" project was aimed at "democratising technology" in the country.

Aakash is a low-cost tablet PC. The world's cheapest tablet PC was launched in October last by Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal. Aakash 2 is the upgraded version of the tablet.

"The project is aimed at democratising technology in the country. The focus is on service to citizens and how a Government will interface directly with public without any human interference," said Union Minister of State for Communications Sachin Pilot.

He was addressing silver jubilee celebrations of the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) here.

Hailing the contribution of C-DAC, Pilot said it had played a major role in taking IT to the masses and the future challenges "will be of interoperability and sustainability."

"Content must be available in all languages and at all platforms. 2012 is about a different India. Our quintessential hunger for knowledge has not changed. While India continues to grow, the game changer will be the transition of our society into a knowledge society."

Sam Pitroda, Adviser to Prime Minister on innovations, said the first phase of the telecom revolution was already over, and we have "entered the second phase of the revolution where the focus is on democratisation of information."

"The National Knowledge Network (NKN) is probably the biggest example of this initiative, but the key here is to learn to use this capability. NKN connects 2,50,000 villages through an optical fiber network and through this network, the villagers will be able to access a number of services from the Government. This has a huge implication on e-Governance."

Three products from the R&D stable of C-DAC were released on the occasion by the Minister.

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Aakash gets Rs 765 crore in Budget 2012

The world's cheapest tablet project has been allocated about Rs 765 crore in Budget 2012-13, which is likely to trigger the second phase of the project expected to begin in April, even as the first phase is stuck in a deadlock.
The allocation for Aakash has been made under the National Mission for Education through ICT of Ministry of Human Resource and Development. The mission had launched the low-cost tablet project, last year.
According to official sources, the money allocated is 'sufficient' for the second phase of the project. Aakash-II is likely to cost the government about 569 crore for about 50 lakh tablets.
"Most of the money is likely to be utilized for the Aakash project. Some of it will be utilized for developing e-content," said a senior government official involved in the project.
The government plans to procure about 50 lakh tablets, in a phased manner, at 2,276 each. Half of the cost (about 1138 per tablet) will be subsidized by the central government. The rest will be borne by the state governments, who want to distribute Aakash tablets in state colleges and institutions.

The billion dollar- five-year fund allocated to NME-ICT mission expired on March 31, which led to a fresh allocation by Finance Minister Prefab Mukherjee in the Union Budget 2012-13. The new allocation comes even as IIT Rajasthan was unable to utilize about 25 crore allocated for phase I of the Aakash project, due to a disagreement with its vendor.
According to a government official heading the Aakash project, only about 500 Aakash-I tablets have been procured so far. However, according to Data wind officials, they have supplied about 10,000 tablets to IIT Rajasthan, for which they are yet to receive money.
Disagreement over specifications of the tablet has added to the deadlock. "Allocation of more money to a project which is not stable is not an established practice in government," said Satish Jha, President of One Laptop Per Child foundation, which has a competing product in the market.
Meanwhile, the government has washed its hands off the deadlock, citing it as a commercial dispute between two parties. Nonetheless, Minister for Human Resource and Development Kapil Sibal said in Lok Sabha earlier this month, that Data wind will supply about 100,000 improved tablets.
Sibal also plans to launch a tender in April for Aakash-II, which are expected to come with a better processor and capacitive touchscreen, but at the same price.

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Samsung Galaxy S3: wireless charging a possibility

Reports from Korea suggest the Samsung Galaxy S3 may come with wireless charging capabilities allowing you to say goodbye to that fiddly night-time plug in ritual.

According to an anonymous source, Korean publication DDaily says it has been told that the hotly-anticipated Galaxy S3 will allow users to do away with wires as it will arrive with a built in inductive charger.

The source goes on to say that the Galaxy S3 will be able to charge from a distance of 1-2 meters from the charger base.

Look mum, no wires!

Wireless charging is nothing new, with a variety of cases and charging mats currently available on the market to suit a range of handsets and built in wireless charging technology has had its outing in the form of the Palm Pre among others.

The hope is if Samsung manages to squeeze this technology in a handset, which is already rumoured to boast a quad-core processor, 4G connectivity, HD screen, NFC and a decent camera, it will have refined the process making it more efficient and cost effective.

Being able to charge your phone by just placing it down somewhere near a plug is certainly appealing, but if the base station is not included in the box (which we reckon is more than likely) we still expect a substantial cost to be involved to pick one up.

We're taking this latest report with two large fistfuls of salt, as it would seem unlikely Samsung will be able to keep the weight and depth of the Galaxy S3 down to a reasonable level with all the touted tech it's expected to pack into it.

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