Orissa Villages go Wi-Fi, Have an E-postman

In Orissa, a state transport bus service is contributing to Internet connectivity. Every time the bus passes through Raghurajpur village in the state, it becomes the villagers' ticket to Internet connectivity. The bus is fitted with a Wi-Fi box and is a source of help to many villagers.

"The Internet has really improved my sales. In my 30-year career as an artist, we never had such facilities. Now, I can contact customers, and they can contact me,” says artist Sarat Mohapatra.

The United Villages kiosk in Raghurajpur is equipped with a Wi-Fi antenna and computers, and Mohapatra saves his emails on the hard disk. When the Wi-Fi enabled bus passes through Raghurajpur, it picks up his email and delivers it to a nearby town with Internet connectivity.

"Many villages cannot be connected because of lack of infrastructure and because most people can't afford it. With this, email is Re. 1 and attachments cost an extra Re. 1. The infrastructure is just a bus,” said Kishore Sutar, manager, United villages.

The United Village concept is also called Daknet, or Internet Post, and the bus is like a postman. It connects 25 remote villages in Orissa to already Internet-enabled areas.

A Self Help Group worker, Pranati Mishra, now doesn't have to travel 30 km to Puri to check email from funding agencies. "It's good to have these facilities to contact head office and funding agencies. Now it's very easy; it doesn't waste time or money,” she said.

The Daknet service is not real-time click and surf, but it is still a step towards creating one big global village.