CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu government’s free laptop distribution scheme is likely to be launched on January 5, with beneficiaries already identified for the first phase of implementation.
The scheme, announced in this year’s state budget, is aimed at strengthening digital access among college students from economically weaker sections and enhancing their exposure to emerging technologies, including Artificial Intelligence.
The state government had allocated Rs 2,000 crore in the budget this year for providing laptops to 20 lakh students over the next two years.
In the first phase, around 10 lakh UG final-year students studying in arts and science, engineering, medical, law, agriculture and polytechnic courses in government and government-aided colleges will receive laptops.
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Officials said the majority of beneficiaries have been identified from among students covered under the Pudhumai Penn and Tamil Pudhalvan schemes. The scheme will be later extended to beneficiaries in private colleges. “Students who secured admission under the 7.5% quota in premier private colleges will also be covered under the scheme,” said P Shankar, higher education secretary
Officials said the TN e-Governance Agency (TNeGA) was tasked with identifying the genuine beneficiaries. “By February end, we aim to distribute all 10 lakh laptops to the beneficiaries. In the first phase, final-year students will be covered, it will then be extended to first and second-year students,” said another senior official.
Official sources said the present scheme was planned for December 19 launch, but was rescheduled to January as the laptops were not ready.
After the budgetary announcement, a technical committee comprising experts from Anna University, IIT Madras, National Informatics Centre (NIC) and higher education institutions was formed.
“A key requirement was that the laptops should be capable of supporting AI-based applications. Accordingly, the devices will have Windows 11 operating system and to facilitate this, the Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu (ELCOT) entered into a direct agreement with Microsoft, eliminating intermediaries.
Further, ELCOT has signed a special memorandum of understanding with US-based Perplexity AI, under which students will receive free access to Perplexity Pro AI services for six months,” said an official. Officials said the laptops are being procured directly from Dell, Acer and HP.
In a related development, Udhayanidhi on Thursday slammed AIADMK chirf Edappadi K Palaniswami for questioning the scheme’s timing. EPS had on Wednesday said the DMK was reviving the laptop scheme only to woo voters before the election.
Replying to it, the deputy CM said the scheme was announced in the budget and is not an ad hoc arrangement for elections. “Distribution will begin district-wise once colleges reopen after the Christmas and New Year holidays,” Udhayanidhi added.
