Today in New Delhi, union minister for Human Resource Development, Shri Kapil Sibal unveiled a low cost computing-cum-access device. The expected price of the showcased model is going to be around US$35 (approximately Rs 1,600) per unit, which is expected to gradually dip to about US$20 and eventually to around US10$. This device is going to be built with open source technology that may be the reason to lanuch that with such a affordable price. Awesome!

Source: Press Information Bureau, Government Of India .
I could just found a couple of pictures of this device. I believe this will be a great revolution to improve education and communication system in India. This will be ofcourse a buzz on tech devices and technology world. We love technology and everything that makes this world better. But due to lots of circumstances and unaffordable platforms and devices it is little challenging for Indian students and engineers to show their talent. There are huge group of people, community, students and engineers, they can’t afford computer and laptops and similar devices for learning. I have a very strong feeling that this device will be a miracle for them. Information and knowledge sharing will rapidly get improve and increase with device.
It’s been said over and over again that our education sector has been in dire need of a serious update. It seems like the HRD (Human Resource Development) Ministry has a breakthrough solution for taking our education system into the 21st century. Enter this, the yet to be named ultra budget computing device. The sole purpose of designing a device this cheap was to facilitate a better communication and learning experience for students and teachers. I am sure this will be an “Aladin’s chirag” for our education and communication system if it really happens.

The minimum expected capabilities of the device include:
- Support for video web Conferencing facility
- Multimedia
content viewer for example .pdf, docx, .ods, adp, .doc, .xls, .jpeg,
.gif, .png, .bmp, .odt, .zip, AVCHD, AVI, AC3, etc.
- Searchable Pdf reader
- Unzip tool for unzipping zip files.
- Possibility of installing suitable firmware upgradation.
- Computing capabilities such as Open Office , SciLab , cups (for printing support)
- Media player capable of playing streamed as well as stored media files.
- Internet browsing with flash plug-in, JavaScript, pdf plug-in java.
- Wireless communication for Audio/video I/O.
- Cloud computing option.
- Remote device management capability.
- Multimedia input output interface option (for allowing DTV, IPTv, DTH, streaming etc.)
Elaborating on how the device came into being
The ministry claimed it received only a lukewarm response from the private sector, and then approached professors from IISC, Bangalore, and a number of the IITs around the country. MSc and BSc students were then roped in to produce the main components, most notably the motherboard. Students from VIT were also involved at various stages of the product’s development, with the final motherboard design being fabricated at IIT Kanpur. (Full press release here )