Ravi Shankar Prasad

Minister of State for Coal and Mines

Prasad's first ministerial assignment was in the capacity of Minister of State for Coal and Mines between 2001 and 2003 under Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Prime-ministership. This was on the backdrop of huge losses suffered by Coal India (CIL). As a first time Minister, its revival was a major challenge before him. In a year's time, it began to earn profits.

Minister of State for Law and Justice

His performance as a Minister for Ministry of Coal and Ministry of Mines (India) and a spectacular record as an eminent lawyer earned him higher responsibilities. Prime Minister Vajpayee entrusted him with the additional responsibility of handling the important ministry of Law and Justice as a Minister of State. In this capacity Ravi Shankar Prasad played an active role in speeding up the establishment of Fast Track courts in India for ensuring speedy justice to people. He also steered the amendments in the Representation of People Act, which was prepared in a short duration of 15 days and was promulgated by way of an Ordinance on 24 August 2002. These amendments made it mandatory for a candidate contesting elections to provide information as to whether he was booked for any offence punishable with imprisonment for two years or more and whether he was convicted or imprisoned for more than a year. This further amended the Act and made it mandatory for a person elected to the Parliament or State Legislature to disclose his assets and liabilities within ninety days of taking oath. These reforms were crucial to arrest the influence of crime and money in Indian politics.

Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting (Independent Charge)

Performance of Ravi Shankar Prasad as a Minister of State earned him the confidence of the Prime Minister Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee. He was given an independent charge of the Information & Broadcasting Ministry. In this capacity Ravi Shankar Prasad pioneered the following changes:

Ushering India into Digital TV era: As the Union Minister for Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (India), Ravi Shankar Prasad’s pioneering efforts laid the foundations of digital TV in India. His efforts to introduce the Conditional Access System of satellite TV telecast not only ended the conventional cable TV era but also offered better choices before the viewers. With the introduction of Conditional Access System (CAS), the viewers were offered choices to pay only for the channels they desired to watch. This ended the monopolistic and unhealthy trade practices of cable operators and made cable TV more affordable to the common people. This also ensured that viewers get rid to low quality cable telecast and get to watch television programs in high quality digital contents. His efforts to rationalize the entire cable TV business witnessed huge resistance from the cable TV operator lobbies. However, he was committed to roll out the much needed reforms and decided to move ahead despite resistance. Thus India entered into an era of digital TV telecast at an economical and affordable cost. Gradually, this led to the introduction of the Direct to Home or DTH technology of television telecast. Today, due to healthy market competition and affordable DTH services, the pioneer efforts of Ravi Shankar Prasad has taken a shape of revolution. DTH has ensured that variety of national and international television channels can be accessed from any part of the country. FM Radio Revolution: FM radio offered high quality radio services as compared to noise infested AM telecast. Efforts made by Ravi Shankar Prasad as the Union Information and Broadcasting Minister for liberalizing the FM radio services led to entry of multiple private players into this sector. It not only offered multiple choices to the customers but also opened business opportunities for entrepreneurs. Today, FM radio business and grown into a thriving business creating great job opportunities for young professionals. This has also led the country into an era of localized FM radio broadcasting, thereby promoting and popularizing folk music and protecting India’s diverse cultural heritage.

International Film Festival of India (IIFF) shifted to Goa: India International Film Festival is an annual event for showcasing and celebrating Indian cinema’s achievements and sharing it with the global trends in cinema. This event used to take place at New Delhi. However, as the Union Information & Broadcasting Minister of India, Ravi Shankar Prasad felt the need to re-branding this annual event and make it more popular among the international film fraternity. Goa, the popular tourist destination of India having a long and beautiful sea shore on the Arabian Sea, was felt to be the most suitable destination to host the Indian International Film Festival. He decided to take this festival to Goa. This not only changed the complexion of the entire Film Festival but also drew more and more international participation.

Corporatization of the Indian Film Industry: Indian Cinema which had recently got the Industry status was exploring options for institutional finances. The efforts made by Ravi Shankar Prasad led to corporatization of Indian Cinema. Access to institutional finance, corporatization of production houses, insurance benefits to films and people associated with the film industry and easier access to modern technology gave great impetus to the growth of Indian cinema. This drastically cut down the influence of illegal source of film financing and malice associated with that.

Leading Global Leader Shaping Digital Future

Ravi Shankar Prasad is spearheading the Digital India program as Minister for Electronics and Information Technology since May 2014. Recently UK based think tank Apolitical adjudged him as one of the top twenty leaders in the list of 100 most influential people in Digital Government 2018. He is the only Indian to be featured in the top twenty. He was one of the first leaders in the world who had openly supported the cause of net-neutrality and as a Minister in charge of digital affairs in India declined Facebook the permission to operate Free Basics in India. This literally saved Internet in India from getting robbed of its neutrality in India. He is also known to have taken a tough stand against misuse of social media for destabilising democracy and fomenting violence in society. He had exposed the unholy nexus between leading opposition political Party of India and unethical data analysis firm Cambridge Analytica that had stolen the Facebook data of Indian users for profiling voters and influencing them by sending misleading political information and fake news. Led by Ravi Shankar Prasad, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology sent legal notices to both Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. Unsatisfied with their responses, he ordered the criminal investigation in this data theft episode by India's apex crime investigation body the Central Bureau of Investigation. When incidents of mob violence were reported in few parts of India by viral circulation of fake messages on Whatsapp, he took a firm stand against Whatsapp and demanded technological solutions to curb the menace of fake messages leading to violence. While responding to a debate in the Indian Parliament he openly supported the role of social media in giving a means of expression to ordinary people that they are happily using to question the politicians and media editors, he warned the social media platforms against any misuse of the platform for fomenting violence and terror. Responding to the legal notice served by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Whatsapp took several steps such as mentioning the word forwarded on every message that was forwarded by an user. Whatsapp has also restricted the number of forwarded messages to a maximum of five. Besides these stern regulatory measures that were taken under the leadership of Ravi Shankar Prasad, he is also known for promoting digital development in the rural areas of India by creating a network of 300,000 village level digital entrepreneurs who are operating digital service delivery kiosks known as the Common Service Centers across India. This has not only ensured the availability of digital services in rural areas but has also created job opportunities for 1.2 million rural youth.

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