The government of India will soon launch an advertising campaign that will play on the national sentiments of Indians. The .IN domain, India’s official domain extension will be promoted in this manner.
The domain is however relatively unpopular in the Indian market due to the supremacy of the .com domain name. The Ministry of Electronics and IT (MEIT) is out to change that by aiming the .IN domain at companies, individuals and startups.
Rajiv Bansal, Joint Secretary in MEIT, said :
The campaign should be ready for rollout in a month or so and will play on the people’s nationalist sentiments to nudge them to host their website on the.in domain name.
Even existing websites which are on .com or other domains can be hosted on .in which can then be routed back.
According to a top government official, MEIT has set a target to increase the number of ‘.in’ domain names to 3 million by March next year, from the current figure of 2 million. It is said that the ministry has planned special tie ups with the ministry of corporate affairs (MCA) and the ministry of small and medium enterprises (MSME) to offer discounts to startups and new businesses registering with them for .in domain name.
Bansal added :
The proposal includes offering some kind of a discount – perhaps a new domain registration for Rs 150 or Rs 200 – to attract new businesses
NIXI (National Internet Exchange of India), which manages the .in registry, plans to give the ‘.bharat’ Hindi domain IDN for free with every .in domain. NIXI will target businesses that have wide reach and operate online in both English and Hindi, for e.g. newspapers and companies hosting websites in Hindi. The aim of the campaign is to popularize use of the ‘.in’ domain name, which they claims creates and builds a distinct Indian identity for brands, companies and individuals in the cyberspace.