Government Denies Fadia’s Appointment as Digital India Ambassador, to Clarify

After a bit of to and fro, the government has finally cleared the air on who are the brand ambassadors for PM Narendra Modi’s Digital India initiative.

As part of the Digital India week (1 – 7 July) these four brand ambassadors were nominated for a period of one year to propagate the product and applications being launched by the Department under Digital India programme.

“Thereafter, no other person has been appointed as Brand Ambassador for Digital India“, the statement said. Ankit Fadia, who claims to be an ethical hacker said on Monday that he was issued a certificate to become an ambassador for Digital India a couple of months ago by the department of electronics and information technology.

These ambassadors are appointed for a year and their services will be used for mass awareness programs as and when required. Prime Minister Modi on his USA tour has represented the Digital India to high dignitaries of Silicon Valley including the CEO’s of Google’s Sundar Pichai, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Apple’s Tim Cook. Check out the photos here.

An old Forbes article by tech journalist Charles Assisi titled “Ankit Fadia revealed, ‘ which is a scathing profile of the ‘ethical hacker”, also resurfaced on social media.

Given his reputation as a hacker, there has been much outrage online. You can read the full article here.

When contacted, government officials said that there was a few “technical problem” with the release that had been put out in the morning and that’s why it had been withdrawn and that a new clarification would soon be made.

The story got another twist with the government of India issuing a press release saying they never appointed anyone as a Digital India ambassador.

The government on Tuesday confirmed that it had appointed four brand ambassadors for its Digital India campaign, which kick-started on July 1, after confusion over the matter. “His work mostly involves OS based tips and tricks, Proxy websites and lifestyle”.