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Since e-Post messages are scanned and sent, they can be in any language and can even be handwritten. They could also contain pictures and graphics and can be sent to multiple addresses.

The e-post goes on to prove that e-commerce can be successfully used to fuel rural growth if companies are willing to re-engineer their businesses and products appropriately. Using the Internet is not particularly complex, if the Internet is made compatible with most people's previous experience of writing letters or telegrams. This is what e-post did.

The success of e-post that started in 5 Indian states 2 years back and now rolled across entire country is taken outside India as well. The Government of India, in partnership with two UN agencies, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the Universal Postal Union (UPU), will help Bhutan to replicate the e-post model.

5.4. Lack of Computer Literacy - People's Extraordinary Ability to Learn

An oft-repeated argument that illiteracy is a roadblock in the spread of e-commerce is merely an excuse. It is not the illiteracy; it is the indifferent treatment that villages have received which is acting as a stumbling block in spread of technology. They have been cheated many times by false promises of politicians and businessman alike. Hence, they look at any new move with suspicion that delays the percolation of technology.

According to Prof. Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, "My work has convinced me that all people are basically very smart. You don't have to spend a minute when they see something is useful. They pick it up very quickly. All kinds of superstitions, all kinds of ignorance, melt away the moment they see this is something useful. So you call it telephone. You call it computer. You call it anything that you want. All you have to demonstrate is that something they want is there. If it is education, if it is money, if it is convenience, if it is comfort, if it is health, they see it right away."

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* Contributed by -
Rohit Garg,
Final Year, PGDM,
S. P. Jain Institute of Management & Research, Mumbai.