NEW DELHI: The Government values Internet as an innovative medium and wants it to remain plural, inclusive and democratic, Communications and IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said Tuesday.“We value Internet as a democratic, plural and inclusive platform and it must not be allowed to be abused by a few,” Prasad said, reiterating that Internet is one of the “finest creations” of the human mind.The government has also made it clear that it will stand by Internet as a medium to empower underprivileged and remain open and non discriminatory. “We have always supported Internet’s multi-stake model and value contribution by citizens, private sector players, social groups and academicians,” he said.Prasad also reiterated that the government fully respects the freedom of expression on social media. Working on ambitious programs such as Digital India and Make in India, the communications and IT department is all set to present a report card to the Narendra Modi-led NDA government which is completing a two-year term in office on May 26 this year.During the 20 months in office, the department has put 1 lakh kilometers of optic fibre cable on the ground and 1.30 lakh kilometers of pipe has been deployed, the minister added.The government is also banking on Common Service Centres (CSC) to facilitate connectivity for digital services in rural and remote areas that lack wireless access. Common Service Centres, Prasad said, are important for Digital India as they allow a gamut of services such as healthcare, banking, insurance and other citizen-centric services.“We have created 157,000 service centres in rural regions and aims to add another 1 lakh CSCs in the next one year,” Prasad added. The department is also taking an aggressive approach towards empowering women as village-level entrepreneurs or VLEs to run these common service centers to earn their livelihood."We have come out with a BPO scheme for India’s small towns as the digital profile of the country is limited to urban cities like Delhi, Gurgaon, Noida, Pune, Bangaluru and Hyderabad among others," Prasad said.The government is initiating a tendering process for 48,000-seat BPO centers in small towns soon for which it has received proposals from 17 companies so far, encompassing 125,000 seats. “We want telecom companies to come forward and pick up districts and we can provide an enabling environment,” he added.Prasad also said that the IT sector is a key driver for the growth of the economy and exhorted that electronics manufacturing must push ahead. India’s IT exports have reached $100 billion.On the other hand, the government has received investment proposals of more than Rs 1.20 lakh crore for electronics manufacturing under the mega Make in India program. The mobile devices production in India has jumped to nearly 11 crore units in 2015-16, Prasad added.