Estonia and Telangana have identified areas of mutual interest for cooperation, and both parties will continue with their engagement, the foundation of which was laid in 2018 by means of a memorandum of understanding.
Speaking to The Hindu , Ambassador of Estonia to India Katrin Kivi, who met IT Minister K T Ramarao and IT Principal Secretary Jayesh Ranjan on Tuesday, said that both sides went over the MoU. “We have briefly gone through the areas which are mentioned in the MoU which was signed in October 2018, and it is time to renew it now. Both sides are happy to continue and have identified three, four concrete areas which interest is even bigger, for interaction and where cooperation is of mutual benefit,” Ambassador Kivi said.
Terming Estonia as a champion in cyber security, Ambassador Kivi said that the Telangana government showed an interest in learning about the country’s e-voting technology which has allowed Estonians to vote online. “In Estonia people are able to vote online since 2004-2005. During the last election, over 40% of Estonians were voting online. The Telangana government is eager to learn more about this technology, and I have encouraged the Minister to take a business delegation to Estonia immediately, if the pandemic is controlled, to understand the system of e-voting,” she said.
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Another area of mutual interest in Estonia’s e-health system which has a genome bank, which stores Estonian health data, which is helpful to prevent diseases such as Alzheimer’s. A third area of mutual interest is e-governance.