Rajasthan’s science and technology department plans to teach English and science through satellite communication (Satcom) technology, which will be operated from a centralised location in Jaipur.
According to a news report, the 5,000 schools in Rajasthan’s tribal areas will be provided satellite communication (Satcom) technology.
The schools, including the Hajj pilgrims in the districts, will be trained in the technology and therefore, will not have to come to Jaipur for training.
The Secretary of the Department of Science and Technology (DTS), Mugdha Sinha, noted the schools that had no teachers, or a shortage of teachers were chosen.
The department decided to teach English and science, under the state board syllabus, to students from the 6th to 12th grade.
The students will have access to subject experts and will be taught through receive-only-terminals (RoT) and satellite interactive terminals (SIT).
According to India’s Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP), EDUSAT, a satellite specially designed to facilitate distance education was launched in September 2004.
The satellite covers the whole country. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) set up the satellite-based interactive network. Each hub has a SIT.
The teacher at the teaching-end uses PC-based multimedia systems for a lecture. They can also use teaching aids like black/green boards, touchscreens, and DVD players. The live lecture is telecast using cameras or recorded programmes are transmitted by other means.
It is a two-way facility through which the students will be able to ask teachers questions, the Secretary added.
Recently, the state’s IT department proposed a smart card, the Jan Aadhaar card, to replace the Bhamashah card.
The Bhamashah scheme was launched in 2008, before Aadhaar, and is a direct benefit transfer scheme to promote financial inclusion, women empowerment, and effective service delivery.
News reports noted that the Jan Aadhaar card will consider each family as a unit. Individual cards issued to a citizen will help to keep track of individual beneficiary schemes, including scholarships, pension, and health insurance, etc.
The card could also help the state government create a separate database of its citizens as the central government’s Aadhaar database is not shared with the states, reports said. This database will come handy when formulating new policies and programmes and will help to avoid pilferage and duplication.
The news report said that the proposal has been sent to the Finance and IT departments and is awaiting approval.
Another reason for the development of a separate smart card for citizens is ration cards under the public distribution system in the state is set for a revision. The government plans to switch to smart ration cards replacing the existing paper cards in the form of books.
The department could integrate the smart ration cards with the new cards so that it could serve both the purposes.
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) recently announced that now over 1.25 billion residents of India have the identity card, as OpenGov reported earlier.
This milestone comes along with the rapidly increasing use of the card as a primary document of identification by Aadhaar holders. This is evident by the fact that Aadhaar-based authentication services have been used close to 370 billion times since its inception.
Also, residents are more inclined to update their card details. UIDAI recorded about 3.3 billion successful Aadhaar updates (biometric and demographic). At present, UIDAI receives about 300,000 Aadhaar updates requests every day.
These new centres are in line with the ‘The Aadhaar and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2019’ that replaces the Aadhaar and Other Laws (Amendment) Ordinance, 2019.
The decision will enable the UIDAI to have a more robust mechanism to serve public interests and prevent the misuse of Aadhar cards.
