The Indian government's US$10 laptop project, which had attracted the world's attention, has proved a joke. The Times of India reports that the new product hyped as the $10 laptop "prototype" by the Department of Human Resources Development "wasn't a laptop at all but a computing device" to store educational content.

According to the paper, the so-called $10 laptop displayed during the inauguration of the National Mission on Education Using IT Technology in Tirupati turned out to be a storage device measuring 10 by 5 inches. Without a keyboard, it was only able to read stored content and meets none of the requirements for a laptop. Even so, the price even went up to $30.

Fox News carried a derisive article entitled "India's '$10 Laptop' Revealed as Nearly Useless Brick." The controversy involving the $10 laptop is growing as the Indian government has made no official statement on the scandal.