When Google does something, it’s tough to imagine Microsoft would not catch up. The

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emerging markets labs team at the Microsoft India Development Centre unveiled Project Akshara, a set of tools that will help users enter text of six Indian languages into computers, on Wednesday.

These input tools use free-form transliteration, where users spell Indian language words phonetically. If one types ‘bharat’, the words will appear in Devanagari script. However, unlike Google, this one is a web as well as desktop application that can be used across the entire MS Office bouquet. “This tool will run on any application that runs on Windows,” said Srini Koppolu, corporate VP and MD of MIDC. “In less than two months, it will be a free download.”

“This is unique since it has a visual keyboard. Research shows that around 62 per cent of the population can read or write at least one Indian language, but less than 15 per cent know English. So this is a huge market,” Koppolu said.

He also said that this would enable sales of personal computers, which is still not very high in India. “Of the 220 plus million households, only 12 million have PCs. But there are 450 million plus users of mobile phones. So we need to make PCs more affordable and accessible,” Koppolu said.