A US-based NGO has proposed to provide low-cost laptops to 1,500 school children in Uttar Pradesh under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA).

The laptops, powered by solar battery, will have softwares designed to enhance learning ability of the students using games, texts, graphics and even videos, claims the NGO — One Laptop Per Child (OLPC).

The OLPC is the brainchild of Nicholas Negroponte, co-founder of the MIT Media Lab, and aims at providing the specially-designed and built laptops to the children as a learning tool.

As per the proposal, students of Classes VI, VII and VIII of 25 selected government schools in five districts of the state will be given the laptops as part of a pilot project.

S N Chaturvedi, Additional Director, OLPC, said: “These laptops will help reduce the divide between urban and rural school children.”

The programmes have been designed in such a manner that even children who do not know how to read and write can use the digital activities to acquire reading and writing skills, he added. The NGO has already made a presentation of its proposal before the state government officials.

With each laptop costing around Rs 11,000, the cost of the project will be around Rs 1 crore. “It is a good proposal but expensive as well,” said Anup Chandra Pandey, Secretary, Basic Education and State Project Director, SSA.

Pandey added: “We will put it before the executive committee meeting by the end of this month for approval. Once the committee approves it, we will ask the assistance of Central government to fund it.” If approved, the project will be implemented at Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) on a pilot basis.

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