PRESIDENT IETE

THE OCCASION OF INAUGURATION OF

TIRUPATI CENTRE OF IETE

23^rd DECEMBER 2000

Today is an auspicious day – a day of paying homage to the Lord Venkateswara by dedicating a center at His feet. A long cherished dream has come true – a dream nourished by the Andhra Pradesh IETE fraternity under the leadership of Pitamaha Sh Madan Mohanji, the dynamism of Prof Enoch, the initiative of Professor D Narayana Rao who becomes the Sarathy and takes over the reins today and successive Chairmen of Hyderabad Centre Sarvashri Narayana, Babu Rao, and Laxmi Narayan; the last mentioned, in whom the command is currently vested, has been the compelling motivator besides scores of others – some fervently supportive, others anonymous in rendering help. Of special mention is the contribution of Maj Gen Prem Prakash in creation of this centre. On behalf of the IETE Council, I express deep appreciation and profound gratitude to all those who have worked tirelessly in laying the foundations of this centre. I am particularly indebted to Dr Raoaiyagari Advisor DST, whose presence is a source of strength to us.

I take this opportunity to pay a wholesome tribute to Andhrites. Under the dynamic stewardship of the Chief Minister, you have shown the path to rest of India on e-readiness a term that encompasses the entire gamut of e-enabled services – e-governance, e-commerce et al. Your contributions in human resource development and providing e-leadership are exceptional. Whereas the central government is still dallying on making IT literacy a compulsory requirement for the Government servants, Andhra Government is way ahead in its agenda of facilitating Government-citizen interaction through IT. It has shown the way how this can be done at an affordable cost and at a swift pace. Yours is a model for others to emulate. Yours is a work culture for others to imbibe. The determination, the enthusiasm, the vigour, and the camaraderie that you have displayed are indeed infectious and exemplary.

However, it will be highly presumptuous if we rest on our laurels. We have much work to do to realize the vision, so ardently nourished by our elders. We have set an ambitious agenda for this year. Growth of the IETE is obviously the main plank on which the edifice is to be built. You will be glad that our membership, particularly that of the students has spurted. Yours, and here I address the IETE fraternity of Andhra Pradesh, is no mean contribution to this achievement. However, we have miles to go – a long way indeed. We have to enroll more corporate members, gain industry’s confidence, obtain their active participation in our activities, focus on emerging technologies, and take our non-formal academic agenda to the weaker sections of the society. Above all, we have to reach out to those who are on the other side of the divide, the economic divide, the literacy divide, the digital divide, the cyber divide and the gender divide. We have to action- forward the socially relevant and progressive programmes that we have voluntarily adopted, viz. Mass Computer Literacy Programme of the government, Continuing Education Programme CEP 2010 of the AICTE, Web-based education, Employment Generation Training Scheme (EGTS) for SC/ST/OBCs initiated by the MIT, Norad Scheme of the Ministry of HRD for poor girls and many others. I am confident of your participation, hurdles and problems notwithstanding.

The Year 20001 is going to bring greater challenges, particularly for the Tirupati center. Tirupati is a proposed location for a software park. The industrial units, academia, research units, engineers and the students will take to the IETE only if it is relevant to their daily lives and the services they need. You have a major role to play in convincing them.

In the first meeting of the Millennium council, we took a decision to set up a research center. Since then, we have made tremendous progress indeed. A board has been set up for the purpose under Prof A Kumar of the Indian Institute of Science as the Chairman. It will survey the technologies that are being quested abroad – proven or still budding, develop industry requirements and matrix for evaluating, analyzing and assessing their relevance to the country; identify their impact – sociopolitical, socioeconomic, sociotechnological, initiate pilot projects, estimate timeliness, and resource commitments. We hope the Government, the Industry, the business houses, the academia and the research establishment come forward and create corpus, establish research seats, identify projects, recommend scholars to conduct research and render help in other ways. We have some assurances to that effect from the MIT, the DRDO and the DST. It is the industry and business houses whose participation we covet. I met a large number of dignitaries in Bangalore – Sh Azim H Premji on whom we conferred the Honorary Fellowship of the IETE, Prof UR Rao who was the Chief Guest at the function, Dr Kasturirangan, Chairman Space Commission, and Dr Koto Harinarayan, Director ADA, inter alia others. They all are fascinated by and highly receptive to the idea. Only day before yesterday, Prof D Narayana Rao reminded me of the contributions of the dedicated researchers of Srivenkateswara University in the radar field and our discussions during the meetings of the Working Group on Strategic Electronics, the membership of which I shared with him. He has done some pioneering work. He will be glad to know that the first seat that we have set up under the IETE Research Centre is in this very field.

The IETE Council during its last meeting which was at the beginning of this month, decided to lend an all India character to an affiliate called CASET. It stands for Centre for Advanced Studies in Emerging Technologies. It was nourished by Madan Mohanji through its formative years. We intend giving it a new bearing and thrust. Take for instance cyber security and cryptography. I am aware that much work has been done in these fields, though the effort is fragmented and somewhat incongruent. Now that the IT Bill has been passed which provides for the appointment of certification authorities for the purpose of licensing, certifying and monitoring, the Controller to oversee the activities and regulation of Certifying Authorities is in position, and the law on electronic signatures enacted, there is a need for getting our act together. We have to contend with new ball game nations play of denials, of key escrow, of spying and intercepting. We have to create our own cryptographic solutions and ensure their uniqueness is un-compromised and the mechanisms for key dissemination safe. There is no unified effort in the country, pious declarations of the Task Force on SD and IT notwithstanding. The IETE will be willing to partner any endeavour. We could create some kind of consortium and establish an MOU with Carnegie Mellon University to set up CERT and perhaps an initiative to bring cryptographers and cryptanalysts under the same umbrella if not the same roof.

Mobile Internet, embracing WAP, GPRF, EDGE, Blue Tooth and other 3G technologies is another subject, which will bring new applications and new services. Even in the developed markets, there is a wide gap between the manufacturers of these goodies and what the service-providers promise and what they deliver. Take for instance the well advertised palm-held cell phones equipped with Web-browsing software, or the juvenile craze the PDA, or the hip-struck computers connected to wireless modems with “anywhere” writ large, few are vise to limited vista, Web-clipping or a conducted tour of what is known as “walled garden,” besides endemic portal wars and default hog. We have therefore both technology and market challenges ahead. There are many, many, many more emergent fields, some totally neglected, that beckon us. Let us join hands to address them.

There is a Chinese saying that a long journey starts, but with the first step. We have taken the first step. It is the synergy between market and technology, academia and technology, industry and technology, battlefield and technology, that will make our step firm, lend strength and credence to our endeavors and make us realize our dreams.

Before I request our Chief Guest to formally inaugurate this centre I have the pleasant duty to declare it as our forty first baby and the first one in the new Millennium. I congratulate you. May Lord Venkateswara shower His choicest blessings on the new Centre established at his abode; on the entire IETE fraternity, on the enterprising people of Andhra Pradesh and the country at large . .