With the onset of the pandemic, academics worldwide have taken a hit. Students, who worked hard to make a future for themselves and their families, now find themselves questioning what the future holds for them. With such uncertainties in place, students’ mental health takes a toll and their overall well-being is negatively affected.

To alleviate matters for them, the Governor of Ladakh introduced the YounTab scheme for the students in the Union Territory.

Under the implementation of the YounTab scheme, the students in the Union territory will now get free tablets and computers – devices that are the very basics of e-learning –  to facilitate them in their online studies. 

With Stay-At-Home and social distancing being the only definitive ways to keep the pandemic at bay, e-learning is the only way to have students in the safety of their own houses and also not have their academics affected. 

More about the Ladakh YounTab scheme 2021

This Leh Ladakh YounTab scheme essentially a free tablet providence scheme for students of the newly formed Union Territory. The YounTab initiative of the Department of School Education with technical support offered by the Information Technology department. 

Through the implementation of the scheme, 12,300 tablets with pre-loaded online and offline content will be distributed to the students studying in government schools. 

Salient features of the scheme

The important features of the scheme introduced are as follows: 

  1. The YounTab free tablets scheme aims to improve the technology required for the education of the students not only during the pandemic but for years to come. 
  2. Free of cost tablets will come with pre-loaded online and offline content. 
  3. Tablets distributed under the YounTab scheme will contain textbooks, video lectures and even online classroom-related applications. 
  4. The Ladakh administration has distributed free YounTab tablets computed to class 6th to class 12th students who are studying in government schools. 
  5. The Lieutenant governor of Ladakh union territory marked the launch of the YounTab scheme by distributing tablets to 12,300 students across the UT on the 4th of June, 2021. 

The other aspect of the YounTab scheme

While offering tablets and computing devices is a great idea, it is, by itself, not enough. As we all are aware, just having a laptop or a desktop does not matter if one does not have a sound internet connection that connects the device to the vast ocean of information out there. 

To solve this, the administration unit of Ladakh got in touch with the Telecommunications Department to implement NOFH in Ladakh by laying Optic fibre cables (OFC) up to Block levels instead of VSATs.

To implement this, an additional 115 towers with roughly about 1760 km of OFC cables have also been requested so that 100% connectivity can be offered to the students of the Union territory. 

Summing it up

Academics are crucial to every individual’s life. The pandemic, currently, uproots millions of livelihoods, but to ensure education is to ensure that the future generations will not bear the consequences of current times.