Digital Divide Is Not A Rural Issue: A Qualitative Analysis From The Students' & Local People's Perspectives In An Indian Metropolitan City

With the emergence of digital society as a parallel entity to traditional culture, an individual’s membership now encompasses both the physical and digital realms. Since 2000, and especially in 2015 and 2016, India as a developing country has made notable progress in this area. This resulted in a digital revolution in the traditional systems of economics, politics, culture, education, religion, and law, but this change has also brought to light an important issue: the digital divide. We could find several studies on urban and rural digital divides because the gap is significant in these two diasporas. But hardly any literature can be found that highlights the digital divide in another segment of metropolitan areas, which is ‘under-resourced urban areas’. The study discloses the digital gap between these two segments of an Indian metropolitan city, Kolkata, such as affluent city areas and under-resourced urban areas, with the help of socio-cultural and socio-economic factors. A qualitative survey method was used with an unstructured questionnaire from 100 residents who are the students and others, both from the affluent and the under- resourced urban communities. The study reveals a visible digital gap in the livelihood and utilization of the people between these two segments of the metropolitan city. The outcome provides a path forward to develop more inclusive strategies to bridge the digital divide between various metropolitan segments.