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'It is not the right time. I don't have a business plan. I need six business plans. But my guys are working on it.'

Could you paint your vision of what an Internet community centre will be like?

The Internet community centre is a place where someone can go physically and have access to the Internet without owning his own PC or her own PC or owning access to the Net.

It is not like a cyber café. But the difference being that a lot of information would be more oriented towards community as opposed to what cafés give them.

Cafés give you access to existing databases. Internet community centre is part of the package where you also create local databases, local content, local language.

If you don't have that it is basically a café. But the idea is not to have a restaurant kind of environment but a serious environment and to also have with it all kinds of other facilities like fax, email, copying, some graphics... you know.

It is a business centre where you can go to get lots of local information.

What kind of local information?

Let us start from all the government information, train time-table, land records, birth certificates, police reports, you could go on and on.

All the things that the common citizen goes to the government for. You don't need to visit the office for that. If you need to apply for business license you can do that on the Net. Why do you have to go visit the office?

But we don't have all the laws in place?

We will have to do that then. Look, it is part of the process. You got to create all that. You are telling me why it should not be done. I am telling you what needs to be done. So, do it.

So, we will have to create new laws. Electronic commerce... Take, for example, a small little street in any of our cities and there are 30 people who sell saris. How do they order their saris today?

They write, the purchase orders... three carbon copies. This has been going on for years. Can't we go to an Internet café at the corner sit on their terminal for an hour once a week and order all the material. Suparis, supplies, saris, whatever.

Electronic commerce is an important part of it. It is going to happen. We try to expedite the process. But if that means a change in the law then there will be a change in the law.

But don't think Indian people are not capable of doing it. Indian people are capable of doing anything. Okay?

Don't underestimate them. My father who was fourth grade educated was smarter than I am. I can assure you of that. Okay?

So, don't underestimate them.

We don't have the credit card culture in the country here. How do you expect e-commerce to be so successful then?

So, we will create a different culture here that will bypass the credit card culture.

What kind of culture?

Do you know of angadias (an Indian courier system)?

Yes.

Angadia culture is the best kind of Indian culture. So there will be angadia culture in electronic commerce.

Can you elaborate?

What does an angadia culture do? If I give Rs 50 and say, give it to my cousin in Lucknow, you will use the angadia and deliver it.

But how can you do this in businesses where large transactions take place everyday?

He will collect it once a week and I will settle with him once a day. You have got to solve the problem. I am not saying that every time I do a transaction, ask the angadia to take a train and go. Okay? I am saying, I will settle my transactions electronically. I will have an account and you are my trusted angadia. Because you can trust me and I can trust you.

We will create a whole new network of a different culture. That's what the credit card is also.

What is... what is money?

It is trust. When I use a credit card, all I say is trust me, I will pay. That don't require a piece of paper. Angadia trust is more than a piece of paper. Na?

How do you feel India has changed over the last few years?

India is changing and has changed. We all recognise that. It is on the street. I mean, I am more affluent than my father. My father was more affluent than his father was. Okay?

My father has seen only bullock carts and trains and maybe a 747. Now I take, you know, the Concorde.

It is going on. You are better off than your father. I think we are all better off. You see things are happening. You didn't have this thing (points to the Rediff Dictaphone) for reporters 20 years ago. Everyone has this now. Things are happening.

Our frustration is that things are not happening fast enough. Even when I finish this lunch and go out on the street and see a beggar, it hurts. That's what is bothering us. Otherwise, we are having a great time yaar.

You have to create an environment. Even now when I come back here, I realise that I have a lot of relatives that are not well off. I left them behind.

Not that I can solve every problem, you know. The desire is there to whittle it.

When do you see the Internet community centres happening? What is your timeframe?

I would like it starting... something on ground in 12 months.

How many centres are we looking at?

That depends on the market.

But you must have some target?

In Tamil Nadu we can do 1,500 (centres) in the first year, moving on to 10,000.

In Maharashtra?

I don't know in Maharashtra. I have not done the market study. The market study in Tamil Nadu, I just happen to have it.

(Removes a sheaf of papers from a briefcase).

I am not going to show you this, but I will tell you...

(Reading aloud while shielding it away from prying eyes).

In five years we will have 16,000 ICCs (Internet community centres) in Tamil Nadu.

But what about content in local language? We don't have the right technologies to implement localisation...

We have. We have it. Who told you we don't have the technology. CDAC (Centre for Development of Advanced Computing) has it.

But that technology has problems. You have to put on a template and make some changes to the machine...

So put a template na! If you want it in Gujarati, put a template in Gujarati na! If you don't put a template you can't have it. Where is the problem? There are no problems here. Problems are not something you create...

But there are no common standards (for Indian languages) either...

Happening... happening.

In Tamil Nadu what did we do? We had a national... international conference on Tamil language. People from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, everywhere came, including (people from) America and standardised the keyboard.

(Editor's note: No consensus has been reached on a Tamil keyboard. The issue is expected to be resolved in June).

We have to do that for every language. We will do it. Every state will do it. It is their job to do it. Every CM (chief minister) will call a conference on national language and they will get it done.

Why did you decide to choose the six states that you have for the community centres?

South India has higher literacy... so four states there. We wanted to concentrate on South India because literacy there is higher as opposed to Bihar and UP. It is better to do it in South India. Simple.

The reason we chose South India was that in South India you had already Andhra Pradesh which was doing governance... electronic government; Kerala was sort of different, there's a software centre in Bangalore. And Tamil Nadu looked like an interesting place to go. I mean it is the place for learning. Madras is sort of an education centre, so we thought we will do it there. We talked to people... got a response and since the response was good from the administration and the government we got on to it.

How did you come up with the idea for an ICC?

Don't need a brainstorm for this. If you look at the STD/PCO and say how do I upgrade these people? Are they going to do STD/PCO all their lives? Can I upgrade them and immediately the answer is clear. We got 500,000 of these throughout the country as a base already established. How do you bring them to the national level? It will take a long time to create another 500,000, so why not upgrade these.

Will you go for connectivity from VSNL and other ISPs?

We will create our own international access.

Will you go for your own gateway...

Sure. Sure. We will go for our own bandwidth. That's the main business we are in. That's the business.

You can create your community centre. I am not interested in your community centre. You are the entrepreneur. Create it. I will give you the pipe, cheaper, better and reliable.

Your ICCs will then end up competing with Mahanagar Telephone Nigam's cyber dhabas (down-market cyber cafés)?

Sure. I say more power to them. We need more of this. They should do it. I should do it. And you should do it also.

So, what makes your ICC different from their cyber dhaba?

Depends. It depends on the content. It depends on you. Our whole collaboration is with the local government. The state government is our partner.

But in Madhya Pradesh, where they are doing this kind of work, there are a lot of cyber cafés around but nobody comes to them.

It's a new thing na! It's a new thing.

Can't expect people to use it overnight. It is a new thing. It takes time.

I was the guy who kept saying that you should install phones in villages. Everybody kept saying 'Are you crazy?'

They installed it in some little village and then people came up with statistics saying, look nobody is using this phone. I said 'You got to be stupid yaar'. These statistics don't do a thing. If you install it in 100 villages, they will have somebody to talk to.

If you install it in one village and say, he is not talking to anyone who will he talk to?

The Net is at that level. Information is being created. Some people are using it, some people aren't. It will take some time to reach that critical mass. All of these things require critical mass.

When do you think we will reach this critical mass?

A couple of years. Two-three years.

You talked about a $100 million investment. Where is this money coming from? Will governments have any stake in the ICCs?

The government's stake will be 11 per cent to 26 per cent... whatever. That's up to the government to decide.

Remaining, we will bring. We might find local partners. We will see.

What will be WorldTel's role here? Will you be responsible for the infrastructure?

I do not have all the answers today. I am exploring as I go along. I made up my mind I want to get this done. Okay? I don't know how it is going to get done but it is going to get done.

What kinds of returns is WorldTel looking at?

We will find out.

But you are investing $100 million...

We will invest $100 million. Hundred million is what?

But you have to tell your investors what kind of returns they can expect?

I will tell them na! I will tell them when the right time comes. I will tell them.

It is not the right time. I don't have a business plan. I need six business plans. But my guys are working on it.

You see that man (points to WorldTel Project Director Dr N Ravi who is busy on his cell phone) he is the brains behind it. Dr Ravi. He is my colleague, great human being. Okay? He is from Madras and I rely on him. If Ravi says jump, I will jump, though I am his boss. Okay?

So, Ravi and his team are working on the business plans. They put together the plans on Tamil Nadu. They are being put together for other states.

But I would rather share business plans with the government first than share with the public.

Can you at least give us a broad idea of WorldTel's role in ICCs?

The broad idea is WorldTel would be a catalyst in bringing money, management, technology and help get things done. And we will get this done. What we did to STD/PCO, we want to do this to ICCs in India.

But ICCs require more investment than STD/PCOs?

When phone money was required to set up the STSD/PCO booth they didn't have that also. Okay? They didn't have that money. So, we will line up the banks na!

The bank will give loans to that guy who now wants to expand to being an ICC. Now that guy is established. He is not going to run away. There is a physical presence. He has a telephone. He has a place. People know him.

We will make arrangements with the local banks. 'Is guy ko loan do na.' This guy is a good entrepreneur, so they will help him.

So, will you have franchisees to do that?

We will have franchisees also.

Will WorldTel be directly involved here?

I don't know. I had a meeting with three banks. I met with ICICI. I met with IL&FS... we will see.

Whatever is needed to solve the problem, we will do it.

The Speech

'To me telecommunications and information technology is a great social leveller. It ranks only close to death.' Go >> | The introduction

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