Here is one more attempt to widen the reach of IT education. Growell ITSchool, part of the Pune-based Growell group, has now made available CD-based formats of computer education in the Marathi language. This is being aimed at the school-going populace in Maharashtra.

The CDs'', marketed under the name Prabhodhan meet the prescribed syllabus for IT education for standards V to X of the Maharashtra State Education Board. These have been recognised and recommended by the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Education

"Most IT education is conducted in English. Those who do not know English are unable to take advantage of IT education," says Jeetendra Mantri, chief executive officer, Growell IT''School. "Developing an education module in all the languages will make the penetration of computers easy. Everyone can become computer literate and make use of the benefits of the internet," says he.

The courses, cover basic ground like computer fundamentals, MS-DOS & Windows, the MS Office suite of products including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access and Outlook Express, as well as the internet. While the courses are currently available in CD format in Marathi, the same are to be made available in Hindi, and soon after, in Oriya.

Mr. Mantri believes that the tutors, with their step by step instruction with actual screens on display, help standardise computer education, making quality education uniformly available to everyone, whichever nook or corner they are in. On successful completion of the course, the students can even take up the international certification exam from NCC of UK, subject to other requirements like proficiency in English.

The computer based tutors have been priced at Rs 4000 for a pack of eight CDs (with 10 per cent discount for schools) , and the company hopes to sell 12,000 of these in the first year.

Next off the block will be tutors in the vernacular for Front Page, Flash, Director, Authorware, and Linux.