Gates to visit Chennai in Dec

Microsoft head honcho Bill Gates is expected to visit Chennai in December
this year, said Dayanidhi Maran, union minister for communications and IT.

"I have asked Gates to come to India and also look beyond Bangalore. He
will be visiting Chennai this time," said Maran.

"We need more visible changes. I have also requested the center to
release Rs 500 crore under the Central Scheme for Critical Infrastructure to
fund the construction of 50 flyovers in Bangalore."

Maran also said that the IT industry should grow beyond Bangalore to other
cities like Mysore and Hubli.

Gates has invested Rs 10 crore in a pilot project to take e-governance to the
villages, Maran said, adding, Microsoft had taken the bold step of deciding to
launch bi-lingual Microsoft Windows XP starter (in English and a local
language). "Besides Hindi, the edition would be launched in eight local
languages in January next year."

On the education front, Maran said that Microsoft had agreed to sponsor a
pilot project to train teachers. This involves deploying 5,000 computers across
a hundred schools in six states.

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