Union information centers in rural Bangladesh: A study on users’ perception
Shaikh Abdus Salam, Syed Mahfujul Haque Marjan · SSRN Electronic Journal · 2016
Bangladesh has been experiencing a boom in ICT sectors now a day. ‘Digital Bangladesh’ was one of the major election pledges of the present government. As part of the fulfillment of this pledge the government has established 4516 Union Services and Information Centers (USICs) under A2I (Access 2 Information) programme and providing necessary ICT services at the grass root level of the local administration of the country. There is no denying of the fact that Bangladesh has been remaining in a lower position according to the global ICT index. Still there is a digital divide between rural and urban area of the country too. It is also observed that so far the development has occurred in ICT sector is mainly in Dhaka - the capital of the country. As a result, the rural people are far behind from enjoying minimum ICT services and utilities. However, the establishment of UISCs has opened an opportunity for the rural people to get the minimum benefit of services of ICTs at the rural level. Theoretically there are about 15 to 18 key services like-government forms downloading, birth and death registration, online admission, livelihood information, job information, visa processing/visa form printing, email and internet browsing, computer training and photo/mobile phone services etc are supposed to be provided at every center. The present survey conducted among 100 users of eight UISCs in four districts of Bangladesh - Naraynganj, Gazipur, Munshiganj and Manikganj shows that the users can take as many as 11 services from a UISCs. 99% of the respondents said that by and large they were benefited by the services; but it is further to be noted that a large number of service seekers reported that they face various problems during seeking services. Illiteracy, inefficiency or even ignorance of the entrepreneurs, local politics, lack of attention towards the users, loose monitoring by the programme authority etc are the main barriers to receive the services and achieve full potential of those UISCs. Again there has been prevailing a prominent divide in regards to services and logistic support between peri urban and remote rural UISCs.