Thiruvananthapuram, May 21 (IANS): A record 20.86 lakh schoolchildren in 9,941 state-run lower primary and upper primary schools in Kerala will have the facility of hi-tech IT laboratories in their schools from July, an official said on Tuesday.

K. Anvar Sadath, Vice Chairman and Executive Director, Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education (KITE) told IANS that supply orders for 55,086 laptops and USB speakers and 23,170 multimedia projectors to be deployed to the 9,941 schools in the state have been issued.

The entire cost came to Rs 204.90 crore.

"Hi-tech labs would be set up in these schools from July. As a prelude to this, 76,349 teachers in these schools were given specific IT training during the vacation time," said Sadath.

Sadath added that the national level e-tendering for laptops saw four leading brands and for projectors, five brands competing.

Kerala State Electronics Development Corporation (KELTRON) with the Acer brand quoted the lowest for laptops at a price of Rs 27,893 each, including GST, winning the major tender.

The selected laptops have Intel Core I3 seventh generation processors and AMD Ryzen 3 processors.

For projectors, the lowest price was quoted by Agmatel India with BenQ brand that won a major portion at a price of Rs 21,235 per piece.

The tender also includes a five-year comprehensive warranty for the laptops' components including batteries, power adapters and projector components including bulbs.