Kathmandu, October 4:

At a time when rural telecentres or information centres all over the country are in need of more infrastructure support and facilities, the government has given ‘telecentre movement’ no space in its three-year interim plan.

“During our meeting with Nepal Telecom yesterday, we were told that the Concept Paper is silent on telecentres and that it would be incorporated only in the government’s Detailed Plan later,” Ramesh Adhikari, National Programme Manager, Rural-Urban Partnership Programme, UNDP, told this daily.

“This shows that the government has given no priority in promoting rural telecentres,” Adhikari said, adding: “The government should not seek financial sustainability at present. The telecentres have to work through DDCs and VDCs.” The situation has gone from bad to worse. Those centres that used to once provide Internet, e-mail and desktop services are now compelled to either shut down or cut down their services for lack of financial support. Some are being run as training institutes. The UNDP-run project — RUOP — was one of the pilot projects in Nepal, but it does not sustain any longer.

The Bungmati Telecentre, for instance, was one run under the RUOP, but since the completion of the project duration, it no longer receives support. “Although we have around nine computers at present, we rely on schoolchildren to sustain our centre,” Urvashi Thapa, a volunteer at the centre, told THT. This centre provides Internet service to the school children who in turn have to pay Rs 50 per month for availing the service.

“This was not the way things were planned for running telecentres,” David Shrestha, a former volunteer at the Sankhu Telecentre, said. According to him, there has been political interference in their work. “The general assembly of the working committee, convened on Saturday, dissolved all activities of Sankhu Telecentre, rendering the centre closed since then,” Shrestha said.

The Tenth Five Year Plan had envisioned establishing 1500 rural telecentres to take ICT to the village level to make available locally relevant content to the rural people. Meanwhile, the National Conference on Rural Telecentres in Nepal decided on September 6 to move away from its focus on five C’s — content management, coordination, connectivity, capacity building and care and management — and portray the case studies of other countries.