The Hindu Business Line : Distance is dead, when will time die?

Internet may have reduced distances but wrong rules and rigid rulebooks that limit working hours of cyber cafes widen and deepen the digital divide. India has to keep pace with the world, and work longer and smarter. If people who have the go are indeed to make things happen, time should die, says G. Ramachandran.

Internet access should be made 24x7 across the country's cyber cafés so that those with the `go' in them can work longer, better and smarter.

"Who should care if they have the day?

Hey! for the life eternal-o!

By night we hunt and they're our prey,

Sing Ho! for the death of Time!"

— Tom Smith in Ho! For the Death of Time!

SIMPLE analysis of large samples of Internet users from across the nation shows that most — more than 88 per cent of students and 99 per cent of trades people and farmers — depend on public-access kiosks and cyber cafés. Only a tiny minority has access to the Internet at home, hostel or the office.

The tiny minority, as always, has an edge over the vast majority in India. The vast majority is at a depressing disadvantage. It faces discrimination that widens and deepens the digital divide. Many cities, municipalities and States have rules that prohibit Internet cafés from keeping their shutters up after, say, 11 p.m. The same rules prohibit these cafés from opening their doors to customers and browsers before, say, 10 a.m. These rules are specified and enforced by the police.

`Time' has successfully found new victims in a society that does everything possible to tip the scales in favour of the privileged. The Internet and the global information highway are out of bounds to those who wish to and have to be at the cyber cafés between 11 p.m. and 10 a.m. to work on their education and to conduct their business through the global electronic highway.

For 11 hours in each 24-hour day, almost all trades people and farmers who contribute to the economy, consumption and taxes are shut off from working better, longer and smarter. A business day in the life of hardworking farmers and trades people ends at 11 p.m., and that is the time when they can go to their neighbourhood information kiosk. But, sorry, we are closed, says the shut door.

For 11 hours each day, all underprivileged students who will contribute to the economy, consumption and taxes in future are deprived of Internet access at the inexpensive kiosks. A working day for bright-eyed, hardworking employees who pursue part-time education begins at 9 a.m. Their classes typically end at 8 p.m. They can put in some work between 10 p.m. and 1 a.m. But, sorry, the kiosk's door will be shut just when they begin to gather speed on the broadband-aided info-highway.

In tropical India, the coolest and the least expensive part of the day-night cycle is unavailable to people who have the `go' in them to make things happen by working at the cyber kiosks. India has, as always, found the wrong rules and the rigid rulebooks to push ordinary people into demeaning difficulty, high costs, infrastructure logjams, low output and lower productivity.

If India has to be 5 per cent as good as the developed economies, people who have the go should be set free to make things happen. If people who have the go should make things happen, time should die. Internet access should become a 24x7 feature across cyber cafés so that the underprivileged can somehow find their means to work longer, better and smarter.

Wired there, weird here

India has to keep pace with the world. Working longer and smarter is a necessity. But the sun rises on the Indian electronic highway at 10 a.m., long after the world around is up and working with enthusiasm. The electronic sun sets on the highway long before it is noon in North America. The rigid rulebook and the weird rules have compressed the time available to us to keep pace. Indians have to work twice as hard as the others do and in half the time. What an absurd race to run so that we can keep pace!

Working longer and smarter is easy among students and the enterprising self-employed in developed economies. Their homes are wired and their kiosks work 24x7. Given such an advantage, they can devour their Indian competition quite easily. What this means is there will be fewer jobs for the self-employed here and constrained access to global information on farm produce markets. How willingly we deny ourselves the opportunity to do well!

Bar, no bar

But it is interesting as well as brazenly bizarre that the rules in these cities and towns allow liquor shops and bars to remain open until midnight or well past that hour. And, quite fittingly, most liquor shops and some bars reopen for business at daybreak — 6 a.m. or earlier. The rules for the operations of bars and liquor shops too are enforced by the police.

Our cities, town halls, city fathers, the townspeople and the police prefer tippling and inebriation to education and clean, constructive economic activity for their citizens. Why? Alcohol fetches quantifiable revenue in quick time while education and economic activity are regarded as unquantifiable and weak sources of revenues.

Time is a critical element in maximising revenues from alcohol sales, and it pays to keep liquor shops and bars open for as long as possible. Punctured livers, broken jaws, devastated homes and absenteeism when the sun is up are all affordable because liquor kicks in big revenues.

The revenue models of governments are patently absurd and dysfunctional.

Isn't AIDS scary?

The cyber café rules may not have begun with such a distorted preference when the first rules were framed. The fear that people would be corrupted by pornographic material that could be accessed on the Internet between 11 p.m. and 10 a.m. may have played a critical role in limiting the public's access to kiosks.

But many people who are shut off from the Internet and its patently inanimate pornographic material could find many doors open that offer a drink and more.

Some of the doors may lead to the acquisition of the acquired immune-deficiency syndrome (AIDS). To be sure, inanimate pornographic images and text can do no such harm.

India's genius for self-inflicted harm is legendary. Laws and rules seem to prefer punctured livers and AIDS to education, economic activity and virtual fun.

Punctured livers and AIDS are real. But virtual fun is virtual fun. Pornography could be an irritant and a distraction but no one would need to be in hospital or die because of it. But AIDS kills and there is no policing!

What is 24x7

The police may dislike pornography. They can choose to police the Internet kiosks. They can use taxes to police the cyber cafés 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

It would be money better spent on their and society's goals because underprivileged students, farmers and trades people can make honourable and uninterrupted use of the global info-highway and its unquantifiable traffic of useful information.

In any case, taxes are the result of 24x7 economic activity. No government exempts incomes from taxes if such incomes are earned after 11 p.m. and before 9 a.m. or on holidays. Hence, every citizen is entitled to good governance and responsible policing 24x7. Time has to die, if India has to live and live well.

(The author is a financial analyst. Feedback may be sent to indiagrow@sify.com)