Establishment of Community Information Network in a Developing Nation

In an era of information propagation through various medias like Internet, there are many parts of the world, which are untouched by this wave. This kind of gap, known as ´digital divide´ exists even within a country and even among developed nations. A solution to this problem of bridging the digital divide requires a platform for consuming, sharing, and producing information in an easy-to-use and understandable format, apart from the infrastructural requirements. This paper discusses our approach in the form of a framework called Empowering Communities through KnOwledge (ECKO). Our framework includes the processes, and deployment models apart from the software. The framework enables knowledge sharing among the community and fosters the creation of multi-dimensional knowledge repositories. We illustrate our phase-by-phase approach, which is generic enough to be replicated across countries. The feedback obtained from the stakeholders, and the effort requirements are also discussed.