gov talk
Rajnish Mahajan State Informatics Officer, NIC, Gujarat
Hand in hand with Technology
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ince its inception in the early 1970s, NIC has achieved great successes. Today NIC is focussed on hardware, software development and solution consultancy. NIC is represented in almost all technical committees of government; It helps in framing RFPs, monitoring program execution, hosting government sites and looking after their maintenance. In Gujarat, NIC is actively involved in the much feted e-governance initiatives taken up by different state government arms. NIC plays a big role in ensuring sustainability of projects, which in my view is more important than application development. It has dedicated manpower and wide network reaching down to the district level. The support provided by NIC ensures that e-governance projects do not remain mere pilots, and are scaled up to cover a large group of stakeholders. There should be sustainability not only in terms of continued technical support, but also in terms of working as per the systems and guidelines. Solutions developed by the NIC work to replicate the processes in government to the maximum extent possible and hence are sustainable in terms of user acceptance and integration with existing workflow mechanisms.
The National Informatics Centre (NIC) has been playing a seminal role in the evolution of e-Governance systems. In Gujarat, the NIC has had maximum success in creating a robust network capable of supporting a range of services
GSWAN – connectivity for development Infrastructure has grown by leaps and bounds in Gujarat, and the Gujarat State Wide Area Network (GSWAN) has brought broadband connectivity up to the taluka level. Using this infrastructure, support can be provided from the state headquarters, without the need of visiting the Taluka level office. NIC has developed e-learning solutions using which such support and training is regularly provided. Troubleshooting to the extent possible is also performed using the available infrastructure, reducing the need to travel to individual locations, and also improving response times and system uptime. .
e-governance in Gujarat Gujarat has a number of success stories to showcase. There are so many government projects that have been rolled out across the state. Take land records, for example, it is rolled out completely across the state. With GSWAN fully operational, the land records are completely centralised. There are very few localised databases remaining in the state, almost all data has been centralised and resides at the State Data Centre. This is a great milestone, to have consolidated such huge volumes of data. Coming back to a point I discussed earlier, because of the domain knowledge, NIC is capa-
ble of providing the right solutions which work in a seamless manner. Take land registration, or eMamta (which is now being replicated across India as MCTS), XGN (eXtended Green Node) – a paperless Pollution Control Board system. XGN is also being replicated across many states – Goa, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Uttar Pradesh and a couple of other states have also shown interest. Similarly, the FDCA state solution has also been replicated in many states. The work of NIC has helped saved quite a lot of duplication by cutting development costs by as much as 50-60 percent. The only major costs involved are in customisation. This is a matter of great satisfaction, saving precious national resources, reducing the time in which solutions can be put online, and overall helping states move to the next stage of e-governance. Take the example of Smart PDS. A different level of e-governance would be achieved through this project. The focus is on empowering the beneficiary – power is transferred to the beneficiary, and the way the system has been planned is a classic example of the business process reengineering. This is where the government of Gujarat is different. The ration card data is more or less digitised now. The system is designed to make use of data from other datasets, for example the data from elecDecember 2011 / www.egovonline.net / egov
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toral rolls, for the purpose of authenticating identity. When there is linkage between different sets of data, chances of fraud are reduced and authentication of identity is much more reliable. When work done by one public agency is utilised by other agencies, the nation saves resources. By moving to the biometric bar-coded system, control is shifted into the hands of beneficiary, and chances of foul play are reduced to a great extent. Bogus cards get eliminated and genuine beneficiaries are empowered. Admissions process for many courses, such as MBA, MCA and Engineering, Diploma, etc., have been moved online. The system has inbuilt provisions for transparency. The entire merit list gets presented online, along with the information on what college who has to attend. Gujarat has been successful in e-governance primarily due to its visionary leadership, which endeavours to put in place a robust infrastructure and provides the much needed support in terms of resources and manpower.
The Next Phase of e-Governance As governments move towards adopting new technologies such as Cloud Computing, sharing of data will be the next level we aspire to reach. Having consolidated data to a large extent, it will now be possible to use the same dataset for different users by sharing data across environments and stakeholders. Even users outside the government could be allowed to use this data with proper safeguards and regulations. Mobile governance will also come up in a big way. Governance will become increasingly faceless and most services will be available online. Take the example of recruitment. NIC has developed the OJAS application, which facilitates the recruitment process for a number of departments. Applicants need not run around for getting application forms and making submissions. Advertisements are placed in the newspapers and applications filled online. The system has required filters and information is validated by the system at the time of filling itself.
In the recruitment process, we do not need to authenticate every candidate’s document at the first stage itself. When there is freedom from needless delays, the department as well as the candidates benefit. The recruitment time-cycle is reduced to a considerable state. The OJAS application also helps in planning the examinations by integrating availability of exam halls and matching it against candidates, and developing a seating plan. Call letters for exams are also generated by the system and candidates can download the same. OJAS has been an immense success and it is one of the most popular websites in the state.
A satisfying journey Working in a progressive state is a highly satisfying and challenging experience. One gets the chance of being part of the team that develops world class infrastructure, and comes up with innovative solutions. But there are also the times when one has to let go of some ‘dream project’ due to paucity of time and resources.
industry voices
Gujarat to be the Most Favored IT Destination Whether it is an education application, a healthcare application or a public service delivery technology, the current scenario offers huge untapped opportunity to the government
Opportunities and Challenges in eGovernance The challenge lies in the manner in which technology is being used and deployed to deliver applications and services for the citizens of the country. Whether it is an education application, a healthcare application or a public service delivery technology, there is a huge opportunity that lies in front of the government to leverage in the present scenario. Technologies like cloud computing and unified communication are to be watched out for. Moving forward, the ICT based delivery for citizens should be focusing on concepts like ‘education on cloud’ or ‘healthcare on cloud’. Cloud definitely provides for a lot of opportunities as well as challenges, they are both two sides of one coin.
Lessons from and for Gujarat Undoubtedly, Gujarat has become a big IT hub from where the whole of India can take inspiration and learn. Projects like e-Gram, e-City, e-Dhara hold special importance because of the way these programs are able to initiate and sustain that all important connection between the citizen and the government. On the other hand, other states like the state of Andhra Pradesh or the state of Kerala have done commendable work when it comes to successfully reaching out to the common man. Projects like e-Seva in AP and the weather fore-
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cast project for fishermen in Kerala are some of the projects which should provide inspiration to other states.
Can Gujarat lead the Eric Yu Way? President, Huawei Enterprise The state of Gujarat is already having a lot of initiatives that are presently attracting investment from the IT sector. The state already has a lot of IT and ITES focused companies and is giving a lot of incentives to the ones who plan to move there. And, yes in the near future we will see a new ICT hub and the most-favored business destination in Gujarat.
Why eIndia 2011 in Gujarat? eIndia 2011 will provide an ideal platform to the Gujarat-baed companies, majorly SMEs, to interact and network among their peers from all over the country. eIndia 2011 would surely boost the spirit of IT sector within the state of Gujarat.