HRD Minister M.M. Pallam Raju, it seems, isn't too keen to keep his predecessor Kapil Sibal's dream alive.Singed by his ministry's failure in procuring Aakash , the low-cost computer tablet, from its Canada-based manufacturer Datawind since he took over from Sibal, Raju is now re-examining the sustainability of the project. According to sources, he will take a call on its future once a committee set up to review the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology submits its report by next week.
It has been 18 months since former HRD minister Sibal first unveiled Aakash, which was touted as the world's cheapest computer tablet, priced at Rs.2,750 per unit. Since then, the tablet has been revamped with better features and it was even re-launched at a lower price of Rs.2,263 per unit in November last year.
On Friday, the ministry officially admitted that Aakash II -the upgraded version of Aakash - had also failed to take off as Datawind is expected to miss the second deadline of March 31 to deliver one lakh units to IIT-Bombay. On March 16, Mail Today had reported that until last week, Datawind had only supplied 20,000 units.
"There is still a large gap between what they were expected to deliver and what has reached IIT-Bombay. We have written to IIT-Bombay, asking it to make sure that Datawind meets its contractual obligation or else they can take action against it," said Ashok Thakur, secretary of higher education.