DIGITAL INDIA IS STILL A DISTANT DREAM

78 per
cent of adults in India did not own

Despite talk of Digital India, only one-in-four in the
country reported using the Internet in 2017, which is among the lowest in the
world, according to a new survey by the Pew Research Center. South Korea stands
out as the most heavily connected society, with 96 per cent of adults reporting
Internet use, showed the the survey conducted in 37 countries. While majorities
use the Internet in much of the world, sub-Saharan Africa and India has much to
catch up with, according to the results released on Tuesday.

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  Smartphone ownership among adults in India went up from 12 per cent in
  2013 to 22 per cent in 2017, while social media use went up from eight to
  20 per cent during the same period.

That means 78 per cent of adults in India do not own a
smartphone and a whopping 80 per cent of the population in the country have no
clues about Facebook or Twitter.

While the gap in Internet use between emerging and advanced
economies has narrowed in recent years, there are still large swaths of the
world where significant numbers of citizens do not use the Internet, the study
said.



Internet penetration rates -- as measured by Internet use or smartphone ownership
-- remain high in North America and much of Europe, as well as in parts of the
Asia-Pacific.



Yet, others are not far behind. In Australia, the Netherlands, Sweden, Canada,
the US, Israel, the UK, Germany, France and Spain, roughly nine-in-ten report Internet
use.