Budget 2016: Government to launch digital literacy scheme in rural areas

Government 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.

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.

-With agency inputs