Source: Business standard & Ministry of External Affairs
As part of India’s reach out to Africa, the External Affairs Ministry had signed an agreement with the Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd. (TCIL) in 2018 to establish a pan-African e-network between the two nations.
Key highlights
- This e-network aims at providing quality tele-education and telemedicine facility by linking select Indian Universities, Institutions and Super Specialty Hospitals to African educational institutions and hospitals
- Earlier avatar of this project was operated on satellite-based technology and covered 48 African countries, now been decided to establish two separate web-based portals – one each for tele-education and telemedicine.
- E-VBAB Network Project is primarily a technological upgrade and extension of the Pan-African e-Network Project (Phase 1) which was implemented in 48 partner countries across Africa from 2009 till 2017.
- Over the 5 years project duration, e-VBAB Network Project will provide free tele-education courses in various academic disciplines to 4000 students every year from African countries.
- The Project will also be utilized for providing free Continuing Medical Education (1000 every year) to African doctors/nurses/para-medical staff. Further, Indian doctors, through this project will provide free medical consultancy to those African doctors who seek such consultancy.
- In order to operationalize the e-VBAB Network Project, a Data Centre and Disaster Recovery Centre will be established in India along with Learning Centres in various African countries which decide to be part of the Project.
- There will be two separate platforms for e-VidyaBharati (tele-education) and e-AarogyaBharati (telemedicine) which will link, through web-based technology, various educational institutions, and hospitals in India and the participating African countries.
- The e-VBAB Network Project will be completely funded by the Government of India for its entire duration
