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Budget 2016: Govt to provide digital literacy to 6 crore rural households

Arun Jaitley said out of 16.8 crore rural households, 12 crore do not have computers

Union Minister for Finance, Arun Jaitley giving final touches to the Union Budget as MoS Finance Jayant Sinha and his full budget team look on at North Block in New Delhi

Union Minister for Finance, Arun Jaitley giving final touches to the Union Budget as MoS Finance Jayant Sinha and his full budget team look on at North Block in New Delhi

Press Trust of India New Delhi
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley unveiled a Budget on Monday that plans to launch a mission to provide digital literacy to around six crore additional rural households.

"We now plan to launch the digital literacy mission scheme for rural India to cover around 6 crore additional households in the next three years, details of the scheme will be spelt out separately," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said while announcing Union Budget 2016-17.
Read our full coverage on Union Budget 2016

The government has already approved two schemes to promote digital literacy -- national digital literacy mission and digital saksharta abhiyan.

"We need to spread digital literacy in rural areas. Of the 16.8 crore rural households, as many as 12 crore households do not have computers and are unlikely to have digitally literate people," Jaitley said.
 
Digital literacy can be defined as the knowledge to handle digital devices like computers, tablet PCs and smartphones, and Internet usage.

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First Published: Feb 29 2016 | 12:10 PM IST

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