President presented with Vista, Office 2007 in Sinhala

President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Sriyan de Silva Wijeyeratne (Country Manager, Microsoft Sri Lanka), Prof. P.W. Epasinghe (Chairman, ICTA), Channa de Silva (EPG Director, Microsoft Sri Lanka), Reshan Dewapura (Director/COO, ICTA), Secretary to the President,Lalith Weerathunga, Member of the Presidential Task Force for the implementation of the Year of English and Information Technology and Chairman of the National Administrative Reforms Council, Jayantha Fernando (Director, ICTA).

President Mahinda Rajapaksa accepted a plaque incorporating the first copy of the Sinhala Language Interface Pack (LIP), from Microsoft and ICTA, paving the way towards making significant progress in Rural ICT adoption in Sri Lanka. Accompanying this was a special audio visual message from Microsoft Chairman, Bill Gates, who commended the President for his visionary leadership in declaring 2009 the Year of English and IT.

"One of my primary undertakings in "Mahinda Chintanaya' was to create a knowledge based society... Year 2009 saw the launch of the "year of English and IT" as a major initiative of this Government to help Sri Lanka meet the demands of the 21st Century in Skills and capacities... This is indeed a momentous step in the policy of my government in moving towards a Knowledge Based Society in Sri Lanka.... It is imperative that we move fast in this era of peace, to bring about the dividend of peace and economic prosperity, to all communities... I take this opportunity to congratulate Microsoft Sri Lanka in making IT more accessible to the Rural Community, especially through the launch of the Sinhala LIP for Microsoft Office 2007 and Windows Vista" were a few of the comments from His Excellency's message, and he went on to congratulate ICTA for the many contributions they have made towards the local ICT industry.