UP 'free' laptop scheme bid soon

The documents related to the bidding process for the the ambitious ‘free laptop, tablet’ scheme of the Akhilesh Yadav-led Uttar Pradesh government is likely to be finalised by the end of this month.

The draft bid document, which is being prepared by consultancy firm KPMG, will be ready in the next 10 days before it is ratified by the government, according to a senior government official.

“By the end of this month, we hope the bid document would be ready to be floated for bidding by companies,” said Jiwesh Nandan, principal secretary, IT & Electronics, while speaking to Business Standard.

The ruling Samajwadi Party had promised to give tablets or laptops to students clearing standard X/XII starting from the 2011-12 academic session. For this, Rs 2,800 crore had been provisioned in the UP Budget.

However, this scheme could well cost the exchequer almost Rs 4,500 crore, if all those passing class X and XII numbering over 2.8 million and 1.9 million respectively this year avail of the benefit.

This number will definitely rise next year, keeping up with increment in number of students. Besides, this scheme would also act as an incentive for weaker students to score passing grades, thus further pushing up the number of successful students.

Although, the government had announced the eligible students would get these gadgets by the end of this calendar, but it is likely to stretch to almost March 2013.

Considering the humongous scale of this scheme, it would be interesting to see how the private companies muster resources to bid and subsequently bag the contract.

Alongside, the state is also pursing its IT Park/City ambitions for Lucknow and Agra in first phase. “If bidding companies want to set up their units in these proposed IT infrastructure, the government could separately consider their proposals on merit,” he added.

The government is considering to encourage IT units to harness solar energy for some of their power requirements. A new UP solar policy is in the offing as a cleaner/renewable energy source.

The new IT policy is also likely to be ready by month end with the interdepartmental consultations already over, Nandan informed.

“The government is keen on IT services and software development segment vis-à-vis hardware as we want to capitalise on low cost of living and hiring in our tier II and III cities,” he underlined.