Union Cabinet approves expansion of Digital India programme

Union Cabinet approved expansion of the Digital India programme with an outlay of INR 14,903 crore.

The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved the expansion of the Digital India programme. The total outlay is INR 14,903 crores. Digital India programme was launched on July 1, 2015 to enable digital delivery of services to citizens. It has proved to be a very successful program.

This would enable the following:

• 6.25 lakh IT professionals will be re-skilled and up-skilled under the FutureSkills Prime Programme;
• 2.65 lakh persons will be trained in information security under the Information Security & Education Awareness Phase (ISEA) Programme;
• 540 additional services will be available under the Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance (UMANG) app/ platform. At present over 1,700 services are already available on UMANG;
• 9 more supercomputers will be added under National Super Computer Mission. This is in addition to 18 supercomputers already deployed;
• Bhashini, the AI-enabled multi-language translation tool (currently available in 10 languages) will be rolled out in all 22 schedule 8 languages;
• Modernisation of the National Knowledge Network (NKN) which connects 1,787 educational institutions;
• Digital document verification facility under DigiLocker will now be available to MSMEs and other organisations;
• 1,200 startups will be supported in Tier 2/3 cities;
• 3 Centres of Excellence in Artificial Intelligence on health, agriculture and sustainable cities will be set up;
• Cyber-awareness courses for 12 crores college students;
• New initiatives in the area of cyber security including development of tools and integration of more than 200 sites with National Cyber Coordination Centre

The announcement will give a boost to the digital economy of India, drive digital access to services and support India’s IT and electronics ecosystem, said the government statement.

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