And now, there will be call centres exclusively for the agriculture sector.

The operators of these call centres will not have to imitate any foreign accent but speak in the local language.

They will take on queries from farmers to provide either on-the-spot answers or replies after consulting experts.

The farmer-customers will have to pay nothing for the service; not even telephone charges. The entire cost would be borne by the Union agriculture ministry.

• India and Outsourcing: Complete Coverage

To be inaugurated by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee later this month, this unique farm call centres scheme is part of a major initiative aimed at harnessing information technology for agriculture extension (technology and know-how transfer).

The other initiatives include launching, almost simultaneously, an exclusive agriculture channel on Doordarshan and subsequently roping in local and FM radio stations for disseminating farm information.

Private sector participation in this venture is also proposed to be encouraged, though the bulk of this new IT farm network will be funded and operated by public sector institutions with the help of agricultural research and education networks.

Indeed, considering the massive telecommunication infrastructure that has come up in the country in the past few years, the Indian rural sector, too, seems ready for an IT revolution.

Already, telephone connections are available in about five lakh villages. Radio and television have vastly expanded their reach and reception facilities.

Doordarshan covers almost the entire population. Besides, the All India Radio operates about 96 FM stations, covering predominantly rural areas.

Moreover, the battery-operated radio-transistor constitutes one of the cheapest reception equipment that is readily available everywhere.

All this provides a very broad and extensive listener-, viewer- and tele-connected rural base for area-specific telecommunication.

The blue-print for the massive programme for IT-based agricultural technology transfer was unfolded at the first meeting of the task force on agriculture extension help in New Delhi last week.

It involves the creation of a communication linkage between farm researchers, extension workers and their farmer-clients to transfer technologies and information in a cost-effective manner.

The immediate objective is to reach out to those with specific inquiries, to guide them in adopting relatively more knowledge-intensive forms of agriculture, something that should -- and is, perhaps, bound to -- expand with time.

The Centre will also support the states for extending the use of IT for farm development at the state, district and block levels.

The proposal envisages electronic access, through NICNET, to technical and administrative information.

Under this, electronic access will be provided through the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and its institutes, the state agricultural universities, state and national administrative officials, the database of the ICAR's agricultural research information system and, eventually, the global Internet network.

This apart, all the block-level farm information and advisory centres in the 28 districts covered under the National Agriculture Technology Project, will be electronically linked to district, state and national institutions.

The Union government also proposes to support the states in promoting electronic linkages and computerisation.

Ultimately, the marketing, research, extension and farming communities will be linked to each other and into local, national and global networks.

For the call centres and agriculture TV channel, a good deal of spadework has already been done. TCIL has been short-listed as a consultant to the agriculture department on the various modalities of setting up the call centres.

The company is believed to be finalising the project report.

Arrangements for operating the TV channel, too, are said to have been finalised.

Where the deployment of radio network is concerned, the proposal is being forwarded for formal financial and other clearances.

The call centres will, to begin with, operate through toll-free lines in 12 selected institutes, covering 22 states. These centres will function at three levels.

The first tier will provide immediate reply to the queries raised by farmers.

The unanswered questions will be transferred to the subject specialists at the second tier.

The questions that still remained unresolved will be referred to experts at the third tier for reply through phone, post or personal visit by the extension functionary.

The areas to be covered through IT initiatives include market information; market-led production planning; on-farm and post-harvest management and value-addition of the produce; e-contracting and e-connections with market networks; market intelligence; and wider application of the World Wide Web for the development of agriculture.

Under this new approach for agriculture extension, the personal or face-to-face contact will follow and back-up the IT information dissemination and not, as in the past, precede or substitute it.

The farmer will, indeed, be the centre-stage in all these systems of farm technology transfers. He will not be treated as a passive recipient but as an active player -- a generator as well a user of knowledge.

The upgradation of farmers' knowledge and skills is the key element of this exercise.