The cards can store applications such as digital signatures and other personalised information for individuals so that they can avail services offered by institutions and the government.

The company aims to bring down smard-card costs, which are prohibitively high and hampering the progress of digital services for the citizens.

"The adoption of PKI in the country is very slow because of the costs associated with it. For instance, the smart cards we are talking about cost anywhere between Rs 700 and Rs 2,500 depending on the card type and applications. We are planning to bring it down to range between
Rs 100-200," M Vidyasagar, executive vice-president (advanced technology), told media persons here today.

"We have a strong team of people working on very large scale integration technologies. These people are developing the smart card technology and we expect to make it available within the next six months, he said.

TCS is a licensed certifying authority (CA) for issuing digital certificates and also provides PKI consulting, PKI enabling products and services.

The company recently bagged a prestigious project from Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology (NSIT), Delhi where TCS will deploy its PKI and digital signature services at the institute.

NSIT will become a subordinate-certifying authority so that it can issue certificates to subscribers using the facility and infrastructure of TCS.

The company’s other sub-CAs list includes the Bombay Stock Exchange, Central Depository Services Ltd, National Securities Depository Ltd, and the Noida special economic zone.

"We are looking at PKI practice as a security enabler for organisations and individuals in the country and not as a major revenue earner for TCS," Vidyasagar said.

The company has developed Dhruvam, a comprehensive PKI suite and implemented it for the Institute for Development and Research in Banking Technology and National Informatics Centre, both of which are certifying authorities themselves.