Tahrir Square hero to address India Internet Day

New Delhi: Waleed Rashed, hero of the massive protests at Tahrir Square that ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, will address delegates at the second India Internet Day (IID) here April 26. The IID, held under the auspices of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) Delhi - National Capital Region chapter, will bring together net geeks, e-commerce strategists, venture capitalists and hundreds of aspiring internet start-ups, according to a TiE statement. Rashed, 30, was one of the founders of the non-violent April 6 Youth Movement, an Egyptian Facebook group that started in 2008 to support workers in an industrial town who were planning to strike.

The page quickly acquired more than 70,000 followers. The activists used blogs, social media and text messaging to catalyse the uprising against Mubarak. Senior business leaders from global companies such as Adobe, Flytxt, Google, Microsoft and Vodafone will share their insights and experiences with the delegates. Shashi Tharoor, the minister of state for human resource development, and Raghuram Rajan, chief economic adviser to the Indian government, will also be among the keynote speakers. TiE, founded in 1992 in Silicon Valley, has over 13,000 members across 15 countries. Its mission is to foster entrepreneurship globally through mentoring, networking and education. IANS