E-Governance Initiatives in India
The growth of e-governance first began with National Informatics Centre (NIC) being established in 1977. This was a first major step towards e-Governance in India. Subsequently there were many initiatives that were launched to support the growth of e-governance in India. The launch of NICNET (National Informatics Centre Network) in 1987 was one of the driving forces for e-Governance.. This was followed by the launch of the District Information System of the National Informatics Centre (DISNIC) programme to computerize all district offices in the country for which free hardware and software was offered to the State Governments. NICNET was extended via the State capitals to all district headquarters by 1990. In the ensuing years, with ongoing computerization, tele-connectivity and internet connectivity established a large number of e-Governance initiatives, both at the Union and State levels. Some of the initiatives are listed below:
1. The Bhoomi Project
The ‘Bhoomi’ project was undertaken and developed by the State Government of Karnataka. It was done so in order to computerize all the records of the land in Karnataka. However, the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India had sponsored the project in togetherness with the State Government of Karnataka.
2. Gyandoot
Gyandoot, which means ‘purveyor of knowledge’ in Hindi, is a government-to-citizen, intranet-based service portal, implemented in the Dhar district of the state of Madhya Pradesh, India, in January 2000. The project was designed to extend the benefits of information technology to people in rural areas by directly linking the government and villagers through information kiosks. The kiosks provide access to a variety of government services, such as registration of complaints and submission of applications for the issuance of certificates and loans. Data on prices of agricultural crops in different markets are also available. Gyandoot pioneered the idea of rural telecenters in India. The project concept has been replicated by other information and communication technologies (ICT) development initiatives in India. Gyandoot was considered to be very successful in the early years of its implementation, and the project was awarded the Stockholm challenge information technology (IT) award in 2000 for public service and democracy.
3. Lokvani
“Lokvani” in Hindi language means the voice of the people. Lokvani is a public-private partnership e-Governance program, which has been initiated with the combined efforts of both the district administration as well as the National Informatics Centre in district of Sitapur in Uttar Pradesh. Lokvani has tried to fulfil a commitment to the people in providing them with transparent, credible and accountable systems of governance. Lokvani system has empowered the citizens by generating awareness towards their rights through a seamless flow of information. It is an outstanding manifestation of the “right to information”. The services offered by Lokvani encompass a wide range of government departments (Department of Public Grievances, District Administration, Development Department and Department of Land and revenue). The services offered by Lokvani are (a) Grievance and Petitions, (b) land records, (c) tender service, (d) employment services, (e) information related to government schemes and (f) information about government services.
4. Project FRIENDS in Kerala
FRIENDS (Fast, Reliable, Instant, Efficient Network for the Disbursement of Services) is a Single Window Facility providing citizens the means to pay taxes and other financial dues to the State Government.The services are provided through FRIENDS Janasevana Kendrams located in the district headquarters.
5. e-Mitra Project in Rajasthan
e-Mitra (set up in 2004) is an integrated project to facilitate the urban and the rural masses with maximum possible services related to different state government departments through Lokmitra-Janmitra Centers/Kiosks.. These services include utility bill payment, application & digitally signed certificate services, banking, tele-medicine, e-commerce services, etc and new services are being added to its fold regularly.
6. e-Seva (Andhra Pradesh)
This project is designed to provide ‘Government to Citizen’ and ‘e-Business to Citizen’ services. The highlight of the eSeva project is that all the services are delivered online to consumers /citizens by connecting them to the respective government departments and providing online information at the point of service delivery.
7. Admission to Professional Colleges – Common Entrance Test (CET)
With the rapid growth in the demand as well as supply of professional education, the process of admission to these institutions became a major challenge in the early 1990s. Recourse was then taken to ICT to make the process of admission transparent and objective. One of the pioneering efforts was made by Karnataka. The State Government decided to conduct a common entrance test based on which admission to different colleges and disciplines was made.
8. e-Procurement Project in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat
To reduce the time and cost of doing business for both vendors and government.
9. MCA 21
By the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. The project aims at providing easy and secure online access to all registry related services provided by the Union Ministry of Corporate Affairs to corporates and other stakeholders at any time and in a manner that best suits them.
10. Khajane Project in Karnataka
It is a comprehensive online treasury computerization project of the Government of Karnataka. The project has resulted in the computerization of the entire treasury related activities of the State Government and the system has the ability to track every activity right from the approval of the State Budget to the point of rendering accounts to the government.
11. SmartGov (Andhra Pradesh)
SmartGov has been developed to streamline operations, enhance efficiency through workflow automation and knowledge management for implementation in the Andhra Pradesh Secretariat.
12. SmartGov (Andhra Pradesh)
SmartGov has been developed to streamline operations, enhance efficiency through workflow automation and knowledge management for implementation in the Andhra Pradesh Secretariat.
13. National E-governance Plan
The National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) is an initiative of the Government of India to make all government services available to the citizens of India via electronic media.[2] NeGP was formulated by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) and Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG). The Government approved the National e-Governance Plan, consisting of 27 “Mission Mode Projects” (MMPs) and Tencomponents, on 18 May 2006.[1] This is an enabler of Digital India initiative, and UMANG (Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance) in turn is an enabler of NeGP. The NeGP aims at improving delivery of Government services to citizens and businesses. You can get detailed information on services, projects, knowledge portals, etc. Information related to Service Delivery Gateway, Common Service Centre, State Data Centre, etc. is also given.
14. e-office
The Government of India has recognized the need to modernize the Central Government offices through the introduction of Information and Communications Technology. e-Office is aimed at increasing the usage of work flow and rule based file routing, quick search and retrieval of files and office orders, digital signatures for authentication, forms and reporting components.
15. Immigration, Visa and Foreigner’s Registration & Tracking (IVFRT)
India has emerged as a key tourist destination, besides being a major business and service hub. Immigration Check Post is the first point of contact that generates public and popular perception about the country, thus necessitating a state of the art system for prompt and user-friendly services.
16. UID
The unique identification project was conceived as an initiative that would provide identification for each resident across the country and would be used primarily as the basis for efficient delivery of welfare services. It would also act as a tool for effective monitoring of various programs and schemes of the government.
Pensions
Pensioners registering grievances on the portal get unique access codes, which helps them monitor progress of their cases. The designated nodal officer at the level of Department of Pension & Pensioners’ Welfare and at the level of Central Ministry/ Department can also monitor the progress of such registered cases.
17. Banking
The Banking MMP is yet another step towards improving operational efficiency and reducing the delays and efforts involved in handling and settling transactions. The MMP which is being implemented by the banking industry aims at streamlining various e-services initiatives undertaken by individual banks. Implementation is being done by the banks concerned, with the banking Department providing a broad framework and guidance.
18. Posts
Modernization of Postal Services has been undertaken by the Department of Posts through computerization and networking of all post offices using a central server-based system, and setting up of computerized registration centers (CRCs).
19. e-Governance in Municipalities
It is a unique initiative of the Government of India conceptualized under the umbrella of the overall National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) and the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (Jnnurm) aimed at improving operational efficiencies within Urban Local Bodies (ULBs).
20. Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems
Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS) MMP aims at creating a comprehensive and integrated system for enhancing the efficiency and effective policing at all levels and especially at the Police Station level through adoption of principles of e-Governance, and creation of a nationwide networked infrastructure for evolution of IT-enabled state-of-the-art tracking system.
21. Public Distribution System
Computerization of the PDS is envisaged as an end-to-end project covering key functional areas such as supply chain management including allocation and utilization reporting, storage and movement of food grains, grievance redressal and transparency portal, digitization of beneficiary database, Fair Price Shop automation, etc.
22. Health
ICT for programme management has been undertaken by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare in the Mother and Child Tracking System (MCTS) programme and the Ministry envisages a more comprehensive use of ICT including for Hospital Information Systems, supply chain management for drugs and vaccines, providing ICT tools to ASHA and ANM workers, programme management of National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), etc through this MMP.
23. e-panchayat
The vast majority of India’s population lives in the villages and the Panchayats (village level governance units also known as Panchayat Raj Institutions(PRIs) ) represent the face of the governance for these villagers. To improve the quality of governance of these PRIs including Gram Panchayats, Block Panchayats and Zilla Panchayats, the Ministry of Panchayati Raj (MoPR), Government of India (GOI) has initiated the e-governance scheme known as ePanchayats.
24. e-Districts
These are the de facto front-end of government where most Government-to-Consumer or G2C interaction takes place. To improve this experience and enhance the efficiencies of the various Departments at the district-level, e-District project was envisaged to enable providing of integrated and seamless delivery of citizen services by district administration through automation of workflow, backend computerization and data digitization across participating departments. e-district is one of the 44 mission mode projects under National e-Governance Plan (NeGP).
25. Direct Benefit Transfer
Direct Benefit Transfer or DBT is an attempt to change the mechanism of transferring subsidies launched by Government of India on 1 January 2013. This program aims to transfer subsidies directly to the people through their bank accounts. It is hoped that crediting subsidies into bank accounts will reduce leakages, delays, etc.
26. Aadhar Enabled Payment system (AEPS)
AEPS is a bank led model which allows online interoperable financial inclusion transaction through the Business correspondent of any bank using the Aadhaar authentication. This has helped in financial inclusion. The four Aadhaar enabled basic types of banking transactions are as follows:-
(a) Balance Enquiry
(b) Cash Withdrawal
(c) Cash Deposit
(d) Aadhaar to Aadhaar Funds Transfer
27. Digital India program
Digital India was launched by the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi on 1 July 2015 with an objective of connecting rural areas with high-speed Internet networks and improving digital literacy.[5][6][7] The vision of Digital India programme is inclusive growth in areas of electronic services, products, manufacturing and job opportunities. It is centred on three key areas – digital infrastructure as a utility to every citizen, governance and services on demand, and digital empowerment of citizens.[8
28. UMANG (Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance)
It is a Government of India all-in-one single unified secure multi-channel multi-platform multi-lingual multi-service freeware mobile app for accessing over 1,200 central and state government services in multiple Indian languages over Android, iOS, Windows and USSD (feature phone) devices, including services such as AADHAR, DigiLocker, Bharat Bill Payment System, PAN, EPFO services, PMKVY services, AICTE, CBSE, tax and fee or utilities bills payments, education, job search, tax, business, health, agriculture, travel, Indian railway tickets bookings, birth certificates, e-District, e-Panchayat, police clearance, passport, other utility services from private companies and much more.
The application of ICT to government processes e-Governance can have a profound impact on the efficiency, responsiveness and accountability of the government, thereby, on the quality of life and productivity of citizens, especially the poor; and ultimately, on the economic output and growth of the country as a whole.
Electronic governance goes far beyond mere computerization of stand alone back office operations. It is a means to fundamentally change how the government operates and this implies a new set of responsibilities for the machinery of the government.
