At least 5.5 lakh village-level entrepreneurs or VLEs who run Common Service Centres (CSCs) will receive artificial intelligence (AI) training free of cost. This was revealed by Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw
In the long run, it is hoped that a unified integrated service will be put in place to facilitate the work of the VLEs.
The India AI mission aims to upskill about a million Indians with about 5.5 lakh VLEs being given preference. A budget of about Rs 10, 371 crore is being set aside for the purpose. The capital will also be used to drive AI innovation across India by creating relevant infrastructure for AI computing, nurturing AI capabilities, encouraging and drawing AI talent and by investing in AI startups.
Common Services Centres have been in existence since 2006, serving as the access points for delivery of Government-to-Citizen (G2C) e-services within the reach of the citizen, by creating the physical service delivery ICT infrastructure. They help in making a transparent service-delivery mechanism and reducing citizens’ effort in visiting government offices.
An integral part of the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), the aim has been to cover all six lakh census villages via one lakh CSCs, that is, in a ratio of 1:6 spread evenly across the rural areas of India.
