Wednesday, July 6 2005 14:07 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Coimbatore: Time has come for the villages to become the hub of competence and village resource centres will be the catalytic agent for transforming the village into knowledge hub, President, Dr A P J Abdul Kalam said today (July 6, 2005).

Launching the Amrita-ISRO Satellite network of Village Resource Centres (VRC) at the Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, at Ettimadai, about 20 kms from Coimbatore, Kalam said that VRC was not just an electronic gadget, but a powerful media to empower and make the village a nodal centre for the development of economy of the Nation.

Saying that the country has seen the cities becoming hub of the activity and development during the last five decades, Kalam said that time has come to turn the villages as the hub of competence, with all activities.

Turning to CEOs of leading software companies and educationists, present at the function, he said we should not assume what they want. Users have got tough needs It was very important to have physical connectivity, electronic connectivity and knowledge connectivity to make the economy stronger, since the Nation, with 600,000 villages and 70 per cent of population depended on agriculture and related activities, Kalam said.

Saying that the World was changing from an agricultural society to knowledge-based society, the President said that we should make 2.3 lakh village panchayats into knowledge centres, by making VRCs the nodal centres, so that rural populace get all the information