India develops cheap i-Pad

A low-cost computer, priced at around $35 in India's capital New Delhi.

At the unveiling, Kapil Sibal, India's Human Resource Development Minister, said: "We have reached a (developmental) stage that today, the motherboard, its chip, the processing, connectivity, all of them cumulatively cost around $35, including memory, display, everything."

The device includes state-of-the-art system-ware and multimedia features. The computer's hardware has been created with sufficient flexibility to incorporate new components according to user requirement.

"It will have video web-conferencing, multimedia content viewer, PDF, DOCs, ODS, ADP. It has a searchable PDF reader, an unzip tool for unzipping files. It also has possibility of installing suitable firm-ware upgradation, computing capabilities such as Open Office," said Sibal.

It also features a "media player capable of playing streamed and as well as stored media files, internet browsing with fraction plug, Java script, wireless communication for audio-video, cloud computing action, remote devices management capability, multimedia input/output interface options, it has everything," he added.

The price of the device is likely to drop down to $20 and ultimately to $10 apiece. It was developed by research teams at India's premier technological institutes, the Indian Institute of Technology and the Indian Institute of Science.