[India] Laagan, Tikawali style

["Irfan Khan" <khania2@super.net.pk>]

Laagan, Tikawali style
SUMIT BHATTACHARYA

TIMES NEWS NETWORK ?[ MONDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 2002 04:46:26 PM ]
FARIDABAD, Haryana: An Apple Macintosh computer, a digital movie 
camera and five young boys huddled in front. There's nothing striking 
about the scene, except that the boys are from a non-descript Haryana 
village, and they are working on what will be the third movie 
written, shot and edited entirely on their own. The movie, as the 
makers admit, is inspired by Aamir Khan's Lagaan.

Tikawali, the village the makers of the movie are from, has been 
chosen as part of a pilot project on digitisation of villages, a 
joint effort between Media Lab Asia -- an academic research programme 
funded by the Government of India with the help of the Massachusetts 
Institute of Technology -- and Jiva Institute, a Faridabad-based NGO.

An hour's drive from the Capital, the village has many surprises up 
its sleeve. It runs its own cable channel where movies, educational 
programmes, news capsules and even advertisements shot entirely by 
villagers are shown. The budding movie-makers are given training at 
the Jiva institute, and avail of the facilities there to make their 
ideas come to life.

Tikawali is also testing out a new software, baatchit, which is 
completely language-independent. It is based on an audio-visual 
interface, with categories like Kheti, Pashu, Shiksha, Swastha Vahan, 
Sarkar etc.

When a villager moves the mouse over a category, he hears a voice 
call out the name of the category. "The villagers are excited by the 
visual medium and they want to explore," says Harish Gautam, one of 
the residents. "They can learn about schemes the government offers 
and then make use of them. They are fully aware when they go to apply 
for the scheme, and no one can dupe them," he adds. The software, 
developed by Media Lab Asia with inputs from Jiva, is still in its 
testing phase. If implemented across the country, it can be a 
stepping stone to a "connected" India.

But, can is the operative word, as Stephen Rudolph, director of Jiva, 
points out. "Technology cannot drive development," he says. Why would 
a villager want to sit in front of a computer and browse unless it 
gives him what he needs, he asks. "One can't come in with hi-fi 
technology and expect the villagers to lap it up," he says. "Those 
are the dreams of those who sit in ivory towers. A computer and an 
Internet connection cannot solve the problems of a villager who needs 
water for his crops."

And to address this need for sustainable development, Jiva runs 
vocational courses for the villagers. The villagers keep accounts on 
the computer. "It is the perfect example of technology sustaining 
development," says R P Chauhan, president of Jiva.

"Villagers respond to technology just as the body responds to 
external elements. They absorb what they deem useful," says Rudolph. 
And an example of this absorption was seen when the young movie-
makers rushed with their digital cameras to the scene of a fire near 
the village. They had interviews with the fire chief, eye witnesses, 
and a complete "breaking news" package was telecast over the local 
cable channel.

Whether digital India is a realisable dream is something only time 
will tell, but it has made a quiet start in this Haryana village.

source: 
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?art
_id=28670925