Akhilesh bridges SP ‘digital divide’ with free laptops
Four days before he completes one year in office, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Monday launched the much-hyped and biggest poll promise of the ruling Samajwadi Party by distributing laptops to Class XII pass students.
In a grand ceremony at the grounds of Colvin Taluqdars College in Lucknow, attended by several ministers, nearly 10,000 college students were given specially ordered laptops, made by Hewlett Packard (HP). The launch marked an ideological turnaround for the Samajwadi Party, as Akhilesh said: “It is correct that nobody expected SP to talk of English and computers, but the party understood the digital divide and is trying to bridge it.” His father, party president Mulayam Singh, had always opposed computers and English.
“The laptops will usher in a new world for the students. The world has progressed and if one thing which has changed the world after the (invention of) wheel, it is internet,” he said, in a speech marked by sloganeering by omnipresent party cadres and applause by the students.
The laptop cover, the laptop bag cover and the default desktop screen have the photo of the father-son duo, which also reads “poore hote vaade”’ (promises being fulfilled). Akhilesh also utilised the occasion to address a number of issues, from unemployment to law and order in the state. “It is true that a large number of youths are unemployed, but it was the wrong policies of the previous government which increased unemployment,” he said, saying that a poor youth has nowhere to go for
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