The Government may have a definitive interface with Facebook to effectively increase the penetration of its schemes in social sectors as also connecting villages with internet, a priority area for the Modi-Government aiming “to nurture a Digital India”.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Information & Technology Minister Ravishankar Prasad among others on Friday to discuss diverse ways of engagements with the Government and its “followers” in India, the second largest in the world after America.
It is understood that Facebook, keen to scale up its presence in India, may like to be involved in the programmes involving health and literacy, particularly, education of women. Easy access to internet and making it available in villages may come up for discussion with the PM and Prasad.
“Given the size of Indian market, no one wants to miss India,” said a senior Government functionary referring to the fact that the young billionaire Zuckerberg will be the third high-profile honcho of a US-based tech firm, after Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Jeff Bezos of Amazon, to come visiting India in the last few weeks.
“Your PM Modi has the Digital India programme. I am going to ask him what we at Facebook can do to help achieve the goals of the programme,” said Zuckerberg who is here on a two-day visit to attend the Internet.org Summit.
His visit comes after Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the social networking giant had visited India and met Modi and Prasad. With a feedback and a brief from his COO, Zuckerberg is now expected to build up the case for “increasing interface” with Government schemes and the potential Indian subscribers of Facebook.
Asked whether Facebook would have some kind of engagement in the ongoing “Swachchh Abhiyan” or “Ganga cleaning” project, informed Government sources said the Prime Minister’s meeting with the Facebook head and his thinking on the issue would guide the issue.
Sources said Facebook should be making itself available in India in Indian languages and take social issues like girl child, female foeticide, women empowerment (through cooperatives) or cleaning Ganga river.
During her visit Sandberg had said there is enormous scope for expansion of Facebook, which is already a very popular platform in India. “There is a need to work together in the field of education, in the field of health and other creative exposures,” she had said during her visit to India three-month ago.
Zuckerberg and Modi are on the same page on making internet connectivity easy and cost effective all over the country particularly in villages.
“Facebook is one company. We can’t connect millions of people on our own. So the plan is to work with operators who are already trying to make internet connectivity far more affordable. And we want to work with Governments like India that already have a plan to connect its citizens to Internet,” Zuckerberg said.