..She logs in to the computerized databases of the district administration which gives her access to the citizen charter, government schemes, enables her to lodge a complaint, apply for a ration card, file income tax returns, vote in an election………All these and more without even leaving her village.

Yes this is possible and quite a bit of of this is already happening in many parts of the country with Information Technology touching the lives of people from all walks of life . The promises it holds of making a fundamental difference in the way we manage and opertae is tremendous but it is not going to be possible without deliberate, carefully planned out and sustained interventions for the initial few years. The examples like Dhar in Madhya Pradesh has shown that a mix of entreprenauial initiative and willingness to change can produce great results, and all this comes at a affordable cost for all the concerned stakeholders - from the general people to the district administration. It is also a case in point to show that developing countries can have their own path of human development or progress , very different from the Western, linear development paradigms where IT revolution has been preceeded by certain level of achievements in education, health, infrastructural facilities like electricity, telephone connection, roads etc. Similar efforts in other developing countries have shown that the real efforts should be aimed at lowering the cost of these technologies and customizing them to the local needs so that people can actually use them.

Mitra aims to be the agency whcih can fulfill this dream of a "connected rural India" where the systems for the strong linkages between the governemnt and citizen is established and run on a smooth basis. We plan to implement the government to citizen model in various parts of India with strong revenue models around the services being provided to the general public.

Mitra wants to play the role of technical interface for the people who do not understand technology and the rural interface for the people who do not understand the peculiar Indian rural scenario.