E-Governance : 27/11/09

DELHI 1ST INDIAN CITY TO MAP UTILITIES DIGITALLY
S Ronendra Singh, New Delhi
Financial Chronicle  The Tribune  

The national capital on Thursday joined an elite league of cities such as New York, London and Paris when Delhi government unveiled a unique portal consisting all the over ground and underground utilities such as telephone lines and water pipes in three-dimensional digital format.

Chief minister Sheila Dikshit inaugurated the Rs 120-crore Delhi state spatial data infrastructure (DSSDI) project on Thursday.

Launching the portal, Dikshit said, ?The underground utilities comprising water, sewer, telephone, power line have been mapped for the first time using modern technology. The availability of underground utilities in digital form would enable the concerned line departments to undertake preventive maintenance programmes as well as locate the fault in the underground utility with precision.?

The developed nations such as the US, Europe and UK have taken advantage of this technology for enhancing transparency in government functioning. Delhi being the first state in the country to have such a project, the ?aam aadmi? will also benefit by way of reduced time taken for maintenance, upgradation and laying of all city services with transparency in government functioning and accountability of services rendered through this project.

The portal will provide access to departments such as MCD, NDMC, DDA, Delhi Police, besides bodies of central and state government.

GOVT TO HOLD TEST FOR COMPUTERS
Chandigarh
Hindustan Times (Chandigarh edition)

The Haryana government has decided to conduct a State Eligibility Test in Computer Appreciation and Applications (SETC) for recruitment of data entry operators, office associates, clerks and computer operators in various departments, boards and corporations.

The test to be conducted by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology will be mandatory for promotions at various levels. "The objective of introducing the eligibility test is to give impetus to e-governance projects and applications of information technology," an official said.

As per the notification issued by the General Administration Department, the pass percentage for candidates is 50 percent. There will be no restrictions on the number of chances to pass the test, which will be held at least four times a year. Those declared successful will be awarded a certificate of eligibility by the Electronics and IT Department.

HIGH COURT TO GO DIGITAL FROM DEC
New Delhi
The Indian Express  Hindustan Times (Delhi edition)  

The Delhi High Court plans to start e-courts by next month to reduce paperwork and turn eco-friendly.

With this, lawyers and litigants can stop carrying bulky files and start using a pen drive or a compact disc. Court proceedings, from the stage of filing a petition to getting copies of judgments, will be paperless.

?The necessity of e-courts has arisen due to shortcomings of a paper-based system like storage, maintenance and wastage of a lot of paper,? said Justice B D Ahmed, in-charge of the e-court committee, during the presentation of the project to lawyers and judges on Thursday.

?We?re also working on the project in which live court proceedings would also be seen on the website,? Justice Ahmed said, adding the project will be first started in one court and will soon be followed in all other courts, including the five district courts in the Capital.

E-Governance News: 25/11/09

14,000 POLICE STATIONS TO BE INTERCONNECTED
New Delhi
The Times of India (Delhi edition)

Aiming to beef up the security apparatus in states, the government has embarked upon a project under which about 14,000 police stations and 6,000 other police offices will be interconnected for evolution of an IT-enabled sophisticated tracking system of crime investigation and detection of criminals.

The nationwide project, Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS), is estimated to cost Rs 2,000 crore during the 11th Five Year Plan, Ajay Maken, minister of state for home affairs, said in LS.

 

WHAT USE MICROCARDS?
DNA (Bangalore edition)

The horticulture department has embarked on a mammoth exercise of handing out ID cards to walkers at Lalbagh and Cubbon Park. This comes at a time when the prestigious Unique ID project, led by Nandan Nilekani, is already underway. The UID, once in place, will make the likes of such cards redundant.

 

SOON, BOOK FILM TICKET, PAY TAX AT E-SAMPARK CENTRES
Varinder Bhatia, Chandigarh
The Indian Express

Soon, e-Sampark centres in the city will offer more. From booking flight, railway and movie tickets to getting vehicle and marriage registered, these centres will have everything on the menu.

For five years, the 10 e-Sampark centres in the city have been providing 28 services.

The five-year contract between the Chandigarh Administration’s with the Wipro Consulting Services to run these centres ended recently.

Now, the Administration has decided to renew the contract on the existing business model — Build Operate Transfer (BOT). Like earlier, there won’t by any transaction or service fee.

In a presentation on Monday, Wipro Consulting Services, in agreement with top UT officials, proposed to introduce the new facilities.

Talking to Newsline, UT Director of Information Technology Manjit Singh Brar said, “The success of e-Sampark centres has been phenomenal. We’re gong to make these centres more user-friendly. Certain new facilities are going to be added. Also, more such centres will come up in the city.”

 

HP MOBILE GOVERNANCE
The Financial Express

The Himachal Pradesh government has switched to mobile-governance, through which information will be available through SMS. Expanding the scope of m-governance, chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal on Tuesday launched new services through SMS. As part of SMS gateway programme launched in September last by state’s information technology department, a citizen can get complete information of their polling station by sending a SMS to a code ie 56300, principal secretary IT B K Aggarwal.

 

NILEKANI PITCHES UID TO OFFSET BOGUS RATION CARDS
New Delhi
The Financial Express

Even as agriculture minister Sharad Pawar revealed on Tuesday that over 1.5 crore bogus ration cards have been unearthed in the last two months alone, Nandan Nilekani is trying to get states to log on to the unique identification platform to ensure that subsidised PDS food grain reaches intended beneficiaries.

“We are working with the food & civil supplies department in the agriculture ministry to explain to states the advantages of using UIDs for schemes like PDS. We have held one workshop in the Capital attended by all states. We have also visited 12 states and explained to them how the UID would work,” Unique Identification Authority of India chairman Nandan Nilekani said at an Idea Exchange programme hosted by The Express Group.

Nilekani, co-founder and former chairman of Infosys Technologies, refused to name the states that have evinced interest in the UIDAI’s pitch so far. However, from what Pawar told the Lok Sabha during Question Hour, some states have begun to take the problem of fake ration cards seriously.

E-Governance News : 24/11/09

HELPING SMES ADOPT ICT TO COMPETE & GROW
Nilaya Varma
DNA (Mumbai edition)

The micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) landscape has reshaped significantly in the last few years, thanks to increasing competition, technology development and cost pressures, among other factors. The immense growth in the services segment has given rise to new opportunities and challenges, requiring increased efficiency, productivity and innovation. Small and medium enterprises will have to adopt ICT in their day-to-day business to remain competitive, grow and attract new businesses, especially in the new, globalised and competitive economic scenario.

Considering the MSME sector contributes about 17% of the country's gross domestic product, more than 25% of the manufacturing output and around 40% of the country's exports, the sector has a critical role to play in the India Growth story. And there is a renewed and urgent focus on how ICT can help these companies excel.

This, broadly, was the theme of discussions at a workshop organised in Mumbai recently by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), which is currently implementing a project to promote ICT in the SME sector, to improve business effectiveness and create new business opportunities. The e-governance project, called "Economic development through e-Governance," is a joint initiative of German Technical Cooperation (GTZ), the German bilateral agency, in cooperation with Standardisation, Testing and Quality Certification Directorate, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.

COMMON SERVICE CENTRES
Business Standard

About 55,000 Common service centres (CSCs) have been established in the country till October 31, 2009. Under the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), the government sanctioned the CSC scheme of setting up 100,000 CSCs by the June 2010.

E-Governance 23/11/09

GOVT TO MAKE BIDDING MORE TRANSPARENT WITH E-AUCTIONS
New Delhi, November 23, 2009
The Times of India

The Delhi government is all set to shift to the e-auction mode. A brand new e-platform set-up by the information technology department of Delhi government will allow aspirants to bid electronically bringing in more transparency and take away the possibilities of corruption and manipulation. The shift to the new system starting sometime next week will now make global auctions possible.

GUJARAT IT BEHEMOTH IN TENDER ROW
Amit Arora, Gandhinagar, November 23, 2009
DNA

The country's largest software export firm bidding in the Rs 7.5 cr project by IndextB to build and manage a new portal for the Gujarat government's ambitious e-single window clearance, is facing allegation of material breach in the tender that opened on Friday.

According to sources in the know, the company officials, present at the bid had allegedly made changes in the tender document after the bids were opened. The matter relates to a tender floated by the Gujarat government for setting up and maintaining for five years a portal touted as e-single window for investors in the run up to Vibrant Gujarat 2011. The estimated cost of the whole project was close to Rs7.5 crore. According to sources, the companies that qualified to submit financial bids included Infinide in consortium with Silver Touch, HCL Technologies, and state-owned PSU,

Gujarat Narmada Fertiliser Corporation (GNFC). The IT international major failed to submit the online bid because of 'technical reasons'. So, the company submitted an offline bid, to which other bidders consented.

The process of Friday started at 1pm with technical presentation held by all the competitors. The presentation concluded around 3.30pm and was followed by opening of financial bids, which were in two parts. In part one, amount for setting up the portal was to be quoted and in second the cost of maintaining the same for five years were to be presented. For the latter part, cost per quarter was to be given and total amount would have been 20 times of the same.

However, officials from the competing companies alleged that the officials of the major IT concern in question, striking out the term 'per quarter' and made entry for lump sum amount for part two as well after the opening of the bids. HCL Technologies did not qualify as the technical marks were low and therefore its bid was not included.

NOW, USING OFFICIAL EMAIL IS A MUST FOR BABUS
Manthan K Mehta, Mumbai, November 23, 2009
The Times of India

A decade after the IT policy was unveiled, the state government has now made it mandatory for babus to make use of their official e-mail address to intimate others about inter-departmental meetings.

A GR informing all state government employees about this directive was issued on November 9. At present, only the chief minister's office makes use of email to tell others about meetings and agenda. Henceforth, this system will have to be implemented by all the state government officials. The order also states that the email will be deemed official and no further paper work would be required for the same.

The state government has been lax in extending the scope of IT in Maharashtra. According to the IT Policy issued by the government in 1998, one of the goals was to make obligatory the use of e-mail between state headquarters and district-level offices by January 1, 1999 and up to taluka headquarters by January 1, 2000.

ENABLING EFFICIENCY IN PUBLIC SERVICE DELIVERY SYSTEMS
Osama Manzar, November 23, 2009
Mint

Nothing can exemplify the magnitude of public service delivery and its required effectiveness better than the countrywide public distribution system (PDS) in India. Considered to be the world's largest public service delivery system, PDS is abound with stories of large-scale malfunctioning and opacity in the supply chain of food items sold at subsidized prices.

Millions of poor consumers who rely on PDS seek a streamlined supply chain for their daily rations. They also want to be saved from the whimsical and arbitrary manner in which PDS officials and owners of fair price shops often behave. In a country with close to 35% of its population living below the poverty line, it is all the more essential to achieve a certain level of socio-economic democracy.

The Unified Ration Card Project of Chhattisgarh could be an ideal model. The state department of food, civil supplies and consumer affairs undertook in 2007 the massive exercise of computerizing data--from paddy procurement to storage, milling and distribution of rice and other commodities to close to four million ration-card holders through 10,416 fair price shops. With this, 1,532 paddy procurement centres, 50 storage centres, all concerned district offices, 99 Civil Supplies Corporation distribution centres and 35 Food Corporation of India rice receiving centres have been computerized, covering six organizations. The Chhattisgarh Unified Ration card project received the Manthan Award in 2008 in the e-governance category.

Other efforts at public service delivery are worth mentioning. ePDS is an automated PDS management application system run in Chandigarh, which comprises various modules for better and effective management of the PDS system as well as a linked comprehensive website for information dissemination. ePDS was a nominee for the Manthan Award 2008.

Gujarat's step towards eProcurement (a fully web-enabled application that covers the procurement process from notice inviting tender to issuance of a letter of intent) for all the purchases and procurements in all government departments and societies under the administrative control of the state highlights technological capacity to ensure a greater level of public trust in government functioning towards service delivery.