Introduction

The ubiquitous mouse has a special place in the India psyche. It is revered as the vehicle of Lord Ganesh-the remover of all obstacles. Today, in the arena of governance , its Pentium-powered avatar reigns supreme in the hands of an increasingly e-literate janata. One click is deemed good enough to cut the much-dreaded Indian redtape to shreds. Another one takes the wind out of all those touts hanging around public offices. Public accountability and responsive services seem suddenly just a blip way. Welcome to the transforming potential of eGovernance

The term e-Governance has different connotations:

E-administration- The use of ICTs to modernize the state; the creation of data repositories for MIS, computerization of records. E-services-The emphasis here is to bring the state closer to the citizens. Examples include provision of online services. Eadministration and e-services together constitute what is generally termed e-government. E-Governance- The use of It to improve the ability of government to address the needs of society. It includes the publishing of policy and

programme related information to transact with citizens. It extends beyond provision of on-line services and covers the use of IT for strategic planning and reaching development goals of the

government. E-democracy- The use of It to facilitate the ability of all sections of society to participate in the governance of the state. The remit is much broader here with a stated emphasis on transparency, accountability and participation. Examples could include online disclosure policies, online grievance redress forums and ereferendums. Conceptually, more potent. E-Government Is the name given to the third of the Governments Information Age initiatives to transform the accessibility, quality and costeffectiveness of public services by using technology.

Global shifts towards increased deployment of IT by governments emerged in the nineties, with the advent of the World Wide Web. What multimedia, support hyperlinked information and interactive information meant was a clearer avenue for G to C interactions and the promise of the attainment of the goals of good governance. Governments weighed down by the rising expectations and demands of a highly aware citizenry suddenly began to believe that there can be a new definition of public

governance

characterized

by

enhanced

efficiency,

transparency,

accountability and a citizen-orientation in the adoption of IT enabled governance.

WHY ARE WE PURSUING E-GOVERNDMET1?

Understand the e-government is about transformation; technology is a tool. E-government is about transformation that helps citizens and businesses find new opportunities in the worlds knowledge economy. It holds great potential. Yet, if e-government works, manages information, manages internal function, serves citizens and businesses-then it may not produc all the benefits expected from the time and money invested. Use egovernment to rethink the role of government. Use it as a tool to further economic development and good governance. There are four guiding principles: Government Services should be citizen-focused. People do not need to know how government is organized or who does what. Services need to be offered in ways that make sense to the customer. Government Services should be accessible. All services which can be delivered electronically should be, whether over the Internet,

through mobile phones, digital TV, call centres, or personal computers-customer demand will determine the mix. Government Services should be inclusive. New services must be developed so that they are available to all and easy to use. Managing Information. Information policies must be adopted which are coherent and compatible so that the best use is made of Governments valuable knowledge and Information resources. Electronics government is neither easy nor cheap. Before

committing the time, resources and political will necessary to successfully implement an e government initiative, understand be basic reasons for pursuing (and not pursuing) e-government. E-government is not a shortcut to economic development, budget savings or clean, efficient government; it is a tool for achieving these goals. Especially in developing countries where resources are scarce, rushing forward with ill-conceived egovernment plans can be a costly mistake, financially and politically. Egovernment, as with all reforms, cannot be achieved simply by drafting a law or issuing an order from political leaders. It requires changing how officials think and act, how they view their jobs, how they share information between departments (G2G), with businesses (G2B) and with citizens (G2C). It requires re-engineering the governments business processes, both within individual agencies and across government.

At the same time, e-government responds to changes outside of government. How a society- its citizens, businesses and civil society- deals with government and with information is changing radically in many places. Citizens are starting to expect government services to equal those services offered by and expected of the private sector. Over time, citizens will likely act more like consumers. Government must adjust to this, and egovernment is one tool that can help.

e-Governance and ICT

ICTs (Information and Communication Technology) are effectively showing new dimensions to old institutional setups. There is a reinforced thrust for an informed and participatory citizenry for efficient e-governance. It goes without saying that impact of ICT on institutional changes is fast spreading across the boundaries of social and political arrangements of societies.2 ICTs and the internet in particular, as a means of mainstreaming public policy decisions, practices and processes, while providing citizens with greater and easier access to government services. Increased information flows between the public and private sector and citizens have improved transparency and accountability and established an environment of trust and reliability between citizens and elected officials in many parts

of the world. Moreover, many ministries responsible for ICTs and modernization initiatives have realized the importance of a clear national strategy for becoming a part of the global Information Society and narrowing the gap between haves and have-nots.

Role of Government in ICT

The role of the government in ICT can be distinguished between the following categories: G1: Laying ICT infrastructure, producing ICT equipment, financing pubic R&D; G2: Creating the macroeconomic environment for growth and innovation in ICT, including fiscal policies (cost, innovation, investment, venture capital), legal and regulatory environment (competition, independent regulator, rule of law, intellectual property protection) and channeling and mobilizing resources for ICT; G3: Education policy for the right amount and quality of manpower resources for a network-ready-economy- curricula, ICT training facilities, wiring/networking of educational institutions; G4: Addressing digital divide domestically and internationally, giving signals to markets- articulating a national vision of ICT, according

national priority to ICT, undertaking large projects, championing national interests in international forums; G5: e-government services online, e-procurement, trade facilitation, civil society participation, accelerating the adoption of ICT by government departments and agencies and establishing credibility. To compete successfully in a network-based global economy, governments need to be both leaders and facilitators.

The leadership and facilitation roles comprise the following elements:

Developing national e-strategy, making ICT adoption and network readiness a national priority, bridging digital divide and

championing an e-readiness framework; Undertaking innovative projects that make a difference to lead by example, adopting best practices and pushing for their adoption by others and developing public-private-people partnerships; Implementing right to Information (RTI) and committing to

transparency in governmental operations; Reforming government processes covering areas such as revenues, expenditures, procurement, service delivery, customer grievances etc.,

 Tracking, storing and managing information, promoting production of national content online and through electronic media; According high priority to protection of individual rights, intellectual property, privacy, security, consumer protection etc. and mobilizing the civil society; Documenting best success and wort failures benefiting from knowledge; Developing a supportive framework for early adoption of ICT and creating a regulatory framework for ICT-related activates, e.g. fixed and mobile communication, e-commerce and Internet services; Promoting innovation and risk-taking through fiscal concessions and availability of venture capital; creating investment climate for domestic and foreign investment in ICT sector; Promoting ICT training, education and research; Negotiating and influencing the proper adoption of international framework, norms and standards by participating actively in the governance of the global information economy3. e-Governance is the application of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for delivering Government Services, exchange of information, communication transactions, integration various stand-alone

systems and services between Government and Citizens (G2C), Government and Business (G2B) as well as back office processes and interactions within the entire Government frame work. Through the eGovernance, the Government services will be made available to the citizens in a convenient, efficient and transparent manner. The Government being the service provider, it is important to motivate the employees for delivering the services through ICT. To achieve this, the Government employees are being trained on technology and started realizing the advantage of ICT. The aim is to make them through with eGovernance applications and responsive to the technology driven administration.

What does E-Governance seek to achieve

Efficiency Transparency Citizens participation

Enabling e-governance through ICT4 contributes to

Good governance Trust and Accountability Citizens awareness and empowerment

 Citizens welfare Democracy Nations economic growth ICT is the biggest enabler of change and process reforms with minimum resistance. Decades of attempts for government and process reforms fade in face of what ICT has achieved in few years. People would not so readily accept process change but in the name of ICT they do.

SCOPE OF E-GOVERNANCE
E-Governance is the use of information and communication technologies to support Good governance. It has the following main dimensions:5

GOVERNMENT TO CITIZEN (G2C)

G2C will aim at connecting citizens to government by taking to citizens and supporting accountability, by listening to citizens and supporting

democracy, and by improving public servies. It will involve better services to the citizens through single point delivery mechanism and will involve areas like:

E-Citizen

Under e-citizen integrated service centre will be created. The purpose of these centre will be to take over the various customer services in due course. It will offer services like issue of Certificates, Ration Cards, Passports, Payment of Bills and taxes etc. These centers will become onestop Government Shops for delivery of all services.

E-Transport
The transport aspects that can be easily e-governed include: Registration of motor vehicles, Issue of driving licenses, Issue of plying permissions (Permits), Tax and fee collection through Cash and Bank Challans and Control of Pollution. E- Medicine It will involve linking of various hospitals in different parts of the country and provide better medical services to the citizen.

E-Education
E-Education will constitute various initiatives of educating the citizen and the Government with the various Information technologies.

E-Registration
E-Governing the registration and transfer of the properties and stamp duty to be paid thereon will bring substantial reduction of paper work

and reduce the duplicating of entries. Further the transparency in work will increase and the overall time of process registration will reduce.

Essentials for achievement

Information for All. Keeping the citizen informed, providing him with details of Government activities. The citizen will act as watch dog to Government if the information will be available to him. Certain interest groups like the journalists, opposition will always keep an eye on the expenditure of the Government, status of which will be available on-line. The same will bring accountability amongst Civil Servants. The rationale is to increase the pressure on staff to perform well and to improve public understanding of government. Citizen Feedback: Citizen Feedback is must for improving the Government Services. Unless the Government listens to its customer, it will not be able to find out what does the citizens want. The elected representatives who are said to be voice of citizens also are not the true voice for they get their votes according to their offerings and not their offerings are according to customer wants. In short it is an effort to make the public sector decision responsive to citizens view or needs.

 Improving services: Worlds best companies have done it, Indian companies have copied them, Governments abroad have followed the suit, why cant the Indian Government. Improving the service delivered to the citizen on dimensions such as speed, quality, reliability, convenience and cost. Information Technology will have a big role to play in the same; the services can be delivered from 24hours one-stop Government shops.

CONSUMER TO GOVERNMENT (C2G)

C2G will mainly constitute the areas where the citizen interacts with Government. It will include areas like election when citizens vote for the Government; Census where he provides information about himself to the Government; taxation where he is paying taxes to the Government.

E-Democracy
The e-democracy is an effort to change the role of citizen from passive information giving to active citizen involvement. In an e-democracy the Government will be informing the citizen, representing the citizen, and encouraging the citizen to vote, consulting the citizen and engaging the citizen in the Governance. Taking the citizens input about the various government policies by organizing an e-debate will further strengthen the

e-democracy. The concept of e-debate is similar to chat over the Internet, wherein not only the citizens but also the political leaders contesting the elections participate. He citizens give their feedback about the various policies of the parties and particularly the manifesto of the party. The initiative will further strengthen the process by enhancing the

representative role, improving accessibility of citizens to their elected members and developing the capacity of elected representatives to engage in e-government. Elected members will also be provided with access to the local authoritys Intranet and e-mail systems so that they become available online for decision making and people can easily access them.

Essentials for achievement:

Citizen Participation: For achievement of the above initiative the citizen has to participate in the Government Business and therefore spreading awareness becomes the responsibility of the State. The elections should not be fought on the principle of what one party or other has to offer. But they should be fought on the principle of what the citizens require. Market research programs should be carried out using the Information Systems to determine the needs of the citizens. GIS could be used as a tool to find out potential gaps in the services offered.

GOVERNMET TO GOVERNMENT (G2G)

This can also be referred as e-Administration. It involves improving government processes by cutting costs, by managing performance, by making strategic connections within government, and by creating empowerment. It will involve networking all Government offices so as to produce synergy among them. The major areas are:

E-Secretariat
Secretariat which is the seat of power has a lot of valuable information regarding the functioning of the State. The cross-linking of various departments and exchange of information amongst various components will simplify the process of Governance.

E-Police
E-Police will ehlp to built citizen confidence. There will be two databases, one of police personnel and the other of criminals. The database of personnel will have the records of their current and previous postings. This will help to track policemen specialized in certain geographical regions and skills. Take for example; we want to look for a forensic expert. The database within seconds gives the list of all forensic experts. The same database will give the track of their details like service record, family background etc which will also be helpful intelligent posting

and promotion of personnel. The second database will be of criminals. This database has to be upgraded to notional database for its total utility. By just typing the name of a criminal a police officer will be able to know the details of his past activates, including his modus operandi and the area of operation. Further a database like this will help tap the criminals easily for all the police stations will have simultaneous access to their record. The module will also include G2C activities like online filing of FIRs, finding the case status of an FIR. Creating a database of Lost and Found can assist further lost and found of valuables and individuals.

E-Court
The pending court cases in India have brought the legal system to a halt. Not only are the consumers asking for changes in the administration, but also the system will collapse if it continues in this manner. IT can transform the system and bring in the court cases to a level of zero dependency. Creating a database of cases can do the same. In fact such a system will ehlp to avoid all the appeals to High Courts and Supreme Court, for the Judges can consider the appeals from an intranet wherein the case remains in the same district court but the Higher Court gives their decision online based on the recorded facts of the case. Such a step will not only help the citizens but will also reduce the backlog of cases. Further

the use of IT in the areas like recording of court proceedings, high resolution remote video to identify fraudulent documents, live fingerprints scanning and verification, remote probation monitoring, electronic entry of reports and paper work will further speed up the court proceedings.

State Wide Networks

This will involve linking all the departments of the Government with various district headquarters and the state capital, facilitating the flow of information between the various state departments and its constituents. Here various blocks will be linked to district Headquarters, district headquarters to State Headquarters and State Headquarters to the National Capital.

Essentials for achievement

Cutting Expenditure: With proper process control the input output ratio can be improved. The same can be achieved by cutting financial time costs. Cutting Government expenditure will lead to saving and accountability. Organize around outcomes, not tasks. These principles suggest that a single person should perform all the steps in a process and that the persons job be designed around the outcome or objective

rather than a single task. Say, for example, a citizen applies for permit- it becomes the duty of the receiving authority that the citizen gets the same, rather than moving around to get it done. Managing process performance: planning, monitoring and

controlling the performance of process resource (human, financial and other). Information supports this by providing information about process performance and performance standards. The rationale is to make more efficient for effective use of process resources. Establish a network: Treat geographically dispersed resources as though they were centralized. Government can use databases, telecommunications networks, and standardized processing systems to get the benefits of scale and coordination, while maintaining the benefits of flexibility and service. Strategic connections in

Government should be established like central-to-local, ministry-toministry, executive-to-legislature, and decision make-to-data store. Delegate and Empower: Put the decision point where the work is performed, and build control into the process. Thus, for overall GPR to succeed the decision making should pass on to the people who do the actual work from the people who are just monitoring it. People engaged in actual activities should be empowered to make decisions at the requited focal point and hence to delegate such activities on

their own so that the process itself can have built in controls. This will not only speed up the process but will but cost as well.

GOVERNMENT TO BUSINESS (G2B)

E-Taxation
This will constitute the various services a business house needs to get from the Government, which includes getting licenses etc. In a similar scenario, it can also flow from a business house to the Government as in the case of procurements, from such business houses by the Government. This will become a B2G service.

Essential for achievement

Standards: Standards for Electronic Transactions or E-Commerce needs to be built. The standards will also include standards on content etc. Payment Mechanism: A secure payment mechanism needs to be built to enable payments over the electronic medium.

 PKI: PKI or Public key Infrastructure is required for secure and authentic transactions.

GOVERNMENT TO NGO(G2N) E-Society

Building interactions beyond the boundaries of government by building government partnerships and civil society, it will involve building various associations or interest groups that will ensure the betterment of the society. Such initiative deal particularly with the relationship between government and citizens: either as voters/stakeholder from whom the public sector derives its legitimacy, or as customers who consume public services. Essential for Achievement Publishing: Delivering data to citizens. This will involve open access to Government Information. The citizen has a right to Government information and its activities. Interaction: Delivering data to citizens and receiving data from citizens. This will involve taking feedback from the citizens and interacting with the interest groups.

Origins in India

E-governance originated in India during the seventies with a focus on in- house government applications in the areas of defence, economic monitoring, planning and the deployment of ICT to manage data intensive functions related to elections, census, tax administration etc. the efforts of the National Informatics Center (NIC) to connect all the district headquarter during the eighties was a watershed. From the early nineties, egovernance has seen the sue of IT for wider sect oral applications with policy emphasis on reaching out to rural areas and taking in greater inputs from NGOs and private sector as well. There has been an increasing involvement of international donor agencies such as DfID, G-8, UNDP, WB under the framework of e-governance for development. While the emphasis has been primarily on automation and computerization, state Endeavours to use IT include forays into connectivity, networking, setting up systems, for processing information and delivering services. At a micro level, this has ranged from IT automation in individual department, electronic file handling, and access to entitlements, public grievance systems, service delivery for high volume routine transactions such as payment of bills, tax dues to meeting poverty alleviation goals thought the promotion of entrepreneurial models and provision of market information. The thrust has varied across initiatives,

with some focusing on enabling the citizen state interface for various government services, and others focusing on bettering livelihoods. The Economic Times recently reported that the government in India is emerging as the fourth larges vertical spender on information technology after the telecom, manufacturing and banking and finance industries. According to Gartner estimates, the Indian Government has spent around 1 billion USD on information technology in 2002. This includes the expenditure of the Central and state governments on hardware, software, telecommunication equipment, telecommunication services, and IT

services, but excludes salary costs IT staff. In fact, the government accounted for 9 per cent of the total IT spends in India for the year 2002, and in five years that is estimated to go up to 15 per cent. Though egovernment is still in its infancy, over 20 states/ union territories already have an IT policy in place. In terms of basic computerization, police departments, treasury, land records, irrigation and justice are seen as having the maximum potential. Nasscom estimates that in the next five years, state governments in India will spend close to Rs. 15,000 crores on computerizing their operations. The pressure to be IT savvy is not only to keep with times, but comes from a more pragmatic dimension; loans to governments from multilaterals have now become more or less contingent upon a proper

treasury management system which translates into a computerized system that will tell lending institutions what has happened to the money that it has lent. Currently, Indias manual treasury systems dont permit this with the kind of transparency required.

National e-Governance Plan

A major initiative of the Government for ushering in e-Governance on national scale, called National e-Governance Plane (NeGP) was approved on 16the May 2006. NeGP consists of 27 Mission Mode Projects (MMPs) encompassing 9 central MMPs, 11 State MMPs and 7 integrated MMPs that span multiple backend Ministries/Departments. It also includes 8 program support components aimed at creating the right governance and institutional mechanisms, core infrastructure, policies & standards and the necessary legal framework for adoption of e-Governance in the country. It is implemented at the Central, State and Local Government levels.

State Wide Area Networks

Under NeGP, Government had approved the Scheme for

establishing State Wide Area Networks (SWANs) across the country in 29 States/ 6 UTs at a total outlay of Rs. 3,334 crore. Under this Scheme, it is envisaged to provide secured Network from State Headquarters up to the

Block level with a minimum bandwidth capacity of 2 Mbps. As of March 2009, 7 States/ UTs (Delhi, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Chandigarh, Tripura and Punjab) have already complete the SWAN implementation, while implementation is at an advance stage in 12 States/UTs.

State Data Centres

State Data Centres (SDC) has been identified as one of the important elements of the core infrastructure for supporting e-Governance initiatives under NEGP. The Government has approved the scheme in January 2008 at an estimated outlay of Rs. 1623.20 crore to cover 28 States and 6 UTs across the country. SDC Proposals of 31 States/UTs have already been approved by the Department with a total outlay of Rs. 1378.50 crore.

Common Services Centers

The Common Services Centres (CSCs) are one of te three infrastructure pillars of the National e-Governance Plan and would serve as the physical front end for delivering Government and private sector at the deeorstep of the citizen. The Government had approved this Scheme for facilitating establishment of more that 100.000 broadband Internetenabled CSCs in rural areas of the country at a total cost of Rs 5742 crore.

It is being implemented under Public Private Partnership mode. As of March 2009, number of CSCs rolled out in 20 States of India is 36,485.

Capacity Building Scheme

In order to provide a mechanism for adequate capacity building and training for end user, a Capacity Building Scheme at an outlay of Rs. 313.00 crore has been approved in January 2008. This envisions establishment of institutional framework for State Level Strategic decisionmaking including setting up of State e-Governance Mission Team. A Capacity Building Management Cell has been set up in the Department for overall coordination and implementation of Capacity Building Scheme.

e-District
e-District is a State Mission Mode Project under the National eGovernance Plan. The Project aims to target certain high volume services currently not covered by any MMP under the NeGP and undertake backend computerization to enable the delivery of these services through Common Services Centers. Under this Scheme, pilot projects, which were initiated in 2007, have now been extended to 14 States covering 36 districts. During the year significant ground has been covered in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Assam.

Electronics/ IT Hardware Manufacturing

Electronics Hardware Manufacturing continues to be a thrust area for the Government. The Special Incentive Package Scheme that was announced on 21st March 2007 to encourage investments for setting up Semiconductor Fabrication and other micro and nano technology manufacture industries in India has received very positive response from prospective investors. Seventeen proposals involving an investment of the order of Rs. 157,000 crore, over a period of next 10 years covering setting up of Semiconductor fabrication, LCD panel manufacturing and Solar photovoltaic including polysislicon, under the Scheme have been received.

Information Technology Investment Regions

There is felt need to develop infrastructure facilities in tier 2 and tier 3 cities, as there is little scope of building additional commercial speace in the five tier 1 cities, New Delhi, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Chennai. In order to address this need, a policy resolution for setting up of Information Technology Investment Regions was notified by the Central Government on 29th May 2008. this transparent and investment friendly

policy will help promote investment in IT-ITeS/ Electronic Hardware Manufacturing units.

The Information Technology (Amendment) Act 2008

The Information Technology Act 2000, a legal framework for transaction carried out electronically was enacted to facilitate eCommerce, e-Governance and to take care of computer related offences. Over the years, with several new forms of computer crime, misuse and fraud taking place, a need was felt to strengthen legislation pertaining to information security. The Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 has been published in the Gazette. The Act upgrades the existing legal framework to instill confidence in the users and investors in the area of Information Technology in the country. This Act inter-alia adds provisions to the existing Information Technology Act, 2000 to deal with new forms of cyber crimes like publicizing sexually explicit material in electronic form, video voyeurism, cyber terrorism, breach of confidentiality and leakage of data by intermediary and e-commerce frauds. The formulation of Rules under the Act is in the process.

Cyber Security

Government of India has setup the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) for providing early security warning and effective incident response. It operates on 24x7 basis and is actively engaging its users with early warning alerts and advisories. Nationwide efforts are being made to increase Cyber Security education, awareness and skill sin the country. It is aimed at catering to the needs of critical sectors, law enforcement & judiciary and e-governance project owners. Special trainings programs are being conducted for juridical officer and Law enforcement agencies. About hundred personnel from various Government agencies have been trained at the Carnegie Mellon University, USA as Master trainers that can train many more in the country.

National Knowledge Network

Government had decided to establish a National Knowledge Network (NKN) with scalable multi gigabit capabilities which will connect 1000 nodes covering the universities, research institutions, libraries, laboratories, hospitals and agricultural institutions across the country. This will also act as a backbone for the e-governance. By facilitating the flow of information and knowledge, the network will address the critical issue of access, create a new paradigm of collaboration and enrich the research efforts in the country. The initial phase of the establishment of NKN has

been started by upgrading 15 PoPs of NICNET at 2.5 gbps capacity. Six virtual classrooms over NKN have been established at six IITs.

Significance of the Study

Transparency and accountability
Robert Klitggard has an interesting equation to explain corruption: C = M+D-T. Coouption = Monopoly + Discretion - Transparency. In India, the state holds an absolute monopoly over most of the delivery of basis services. This means that for most of the citizens, there is no exit option available to move from an unresponsive and unreliable provider. This is where e-governance can bring in radical changes. In the Indian case, one can showcase a few pioneering initiatives to underscore the potency of technology to enhance transparency and accountability in matters of governance. Bangalore City Corporation has recently introduced the Funds Based Accounting System (FBAS) as a strategic management tool. Apart from radically altering the basic financial architecture by generating accurate and timely data, FBAS also loops back the information to the public domain. This highly enabling framework of integrating backend reforms with front-end outreach has virtually galvanized civic participation

by applying this credible and open information base to monitor the activities of the local government. This initiative (called PROOF-Public Record of Operations and Finance) is an advocacy campaign that uses the quarterly statement of the corporation as a tool to take information about the financial performance of the corporation to citizens. It seeks to bring multiple stakeholders together in an exercise to track financial statements of the government, develop performance indicators for different expenditures, and create a space for management discussion. It seeks to ask the basic question, where is the money of the government going and what value are we getting out of the money being spent. The work of PROOF has enabled questions to be raised about the assets owned by the city corporation, the way in which these assets are being used, and also the examination of whether development expenditure, like in education, is giving value for money. Another highly enabling application has been in the field of procurement. Bids and tenders for public works are widely perceived to be the fountain-head of corruption in local governments. Saukaryam in Vishakapatnam has addressed this issue by an e-enabled disclosure process of publishing all financial transactions- bidding and auctions,

decisions, tenders, procurement etc. through the net into the public domain. Online Citizen Charters on key services is another example of using the power of ICT to usher in more transparency and accountability. By openly committing to standards and norms, public agencies are now holding themselves to account. And technology has dramatically altered the ease of public access. ` However, there are few downsides to this encouraging scenario. In

many cases, the government websites seldom get up data and therefore public information is rendered obsolete. The cutting edge of the Internet is its dynamic interface and if that organizing principle is truncated, the relevance of the medium ceases to exist. The problem of the last mile also looms large.

Participation and responsiveness

The essence of a true democracy rests upon a healthy contestation of a plurality of views. One undisputed impact of the ICT revolution is the widening of the space for participation and contestation. Space and hierarchy have been virtually decimated by the Internet. This of course, has also meant that traditional power structures have been reoriented and the sarkar-janata relations are showing a shift from a provider-beneficiary

mode to facilitator-participant one. How have governments in India responded to this opportunity/ crisis? Gyandoot and Lok Mitra have a facility for citizens to lodge their grievances and there is anecdotal evidence that complaints have been attended to by the authorities. However, these are sporadic successes. A quick study of the existing scenario reveals that states are by and large, not responsive. For example, though many of the key political figures, such as out ministers and MPs and Chief Ministers have published their email address, in reality, most do not respond to e-mails. The Ministry of Agriculture has an interesting project that provides eextension services through computer kiosks in some Indian states. The success of this endeavour in Ranga Reddy district in Andhra Pradesh is primarily due to the continuous flow of information from officials to women in the community and the responsiveness of the officials to the queries and feedback from communities. The official use tools such as videoconferencing for regular communication with the project sites. There are a few cases a citizen led initiative that have created the space for people to participate in the democratic process. The Lok Satta internet based campaign aims to promote probity in the electoral processes. Such internet based advocacy campaigns have the potential to persuade governments to respond.

It is only when citizens can engage with governments through the new spaces being made available to them can the notion of e-democracy begin to take birth. E-governance must allow for more than interaction. The shift towards e-democracy will be possible only if there is scope for representation the state where the space for consultations are legitimized and citizen voices are incorporated into police formulation and operational modalities; and for influence- when the citizens are accorded right to litigate and directly impact on policy and praxis. However, the possibilities of ICT impacting on the direct representation process to influence policy, which some of the developed countries have been exploring through tools like e-referendums, seem to be quite far away in the India context. The manner in which technology is influencing human development in Idnia seems to be top-down, with elite users, who use the technology to share information and analysis guiding the mobilization of public opinion nationally and internationally to change policy regimes. The more democratic face of the technology, evidenced in the use of technology by the disadvantaged and their participation of in the formulation and implementation of policies, is startle absent. No systematic research has been conducted sto trace effective implementation of e-governance programmes in Punjab and Chandigarh

with special reference to its effectiveness and usability of the soft wares and architectures.

Review of Literature
Ganes P. Sahu, Yogesh K. Dwivedi & Vishanth Weerakkody6 (2009) explains that e-government has become a global phenomenon through its use of Internet technologies as a platform for exchanging information, providing services, and transaction with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government. E-Government Development and fiffusion: Inhibitors and Facilitators of Digital Democracy provides a comprehensive, integrative, and global assessment of the e-government evolution in terms of real-life success and failure cases. Ashwani Saith, M. Vikayabaskar and V. Gayathri 7 (2008) puts together the optimistic voices of techno-idealists, critical social science perspective on technology and a range of empirical material on the impact of Information and Communication Technologies on the lives of people. The author traces these processes across urban and rural spaces for work, consumption, e-governance, and highlights the new kinds of social identities they are fostering in Idnia. It opens up an arena for dialogue

between activists, technologists, policy makers and academia on using Information and Communication Technology for development. Rohan Samarajiva and Ayesha Zainudeen8 (2008) examines Information and Communication Technology with the prospects of policy formulation in the development of the country. They stress on the assumption that connectivity is the opportunity to engage in electronically mediated communication and is good for the society especially in the emerging Asia. Ayesha Zaindeen & rohan Samarajiva9 (2007) examines how theoretically optimal concepts actually get implemented in the hard terrain of emerging Asia. They gleans lessons from five Asian countiesBangladesh, India, Indonesia, Nepal, and Sri Lank- based on their experiences with expanding ICT connectivity. It reports the findings of a cutting edge 3,000+ sample demand-side survey of telephone use at the bottom of the pyramid in Indian and Sri Lanka. Toshio Obi10 (2007) stresses on e-Governance which is regarded as on of the most important subjects in the Information Society. Global egovernance for both public and private sectors is becoming extremely significant in an innovative and seamless world community. Society offers understanding of what information society or ubiquitous society is all about. E-Government deals with different counties/area in the world focusing on

all of their visions, strategies and priority areas as well as on the key challenges and lessons of e-Government. Prasenjit Maiti11 (2007) covers an extensive range of critical areas that have one common them of questioning the accepted parameters of development from different angels influenced by multiple academic backgrounds. An attempt has been made to accommodate conflicting points of view that would facilitate the reader to arrive at his/her own understanding o the problems under purview. R P Sinha 12 (2006) stressed that India in the last twenty years have seen dramatic increase in the development and the spread of information and communication technology along with the advent of the user friendly computing systems and networking. Governments have been quick to pick up its applications for providing better information and services to the people. Vikram K. Chand 13 (2006) focused on successful innovations in public service delivery in India and drawn lesions to initiate scaling up and replication. It documents and analyzes ten cases of innovation in service delivery across a range of sectors in India. The criteria used to choose these cases are four fold. By presenting ten detailed case studies of how public services have been transformed across a range of sectors, the author provides a deeper understanding of the key causal factors and

processes involve in reform over time as well as some of the basic systemic issues that can potentially complicate the implementation of reform. World Bank 14(2006) examines services delivery system in India, focusing especially on specific innovations in service delivery across India, the study identifies common factors underlying their success. In doing so, it highlight the efficacy of six instruments to improve service deliveryfostering competition, simplifying transactions, restructuring agency processes, decentralization, building broad political support for programme delivery and strengthening accountability mechanisms. Covering a range of services and cases-such as ITCs e-Chaupal, Madhya Pradeshs effort to decentralize teacher management, Karnatakas road transport

corporation, Andhra Pradeshs eSeva and Tamil Nadus success in improving human development outcomes-the study draws lessons that can help improve service delivery across sectors and facilitate the transplanting of success stories to other settings. Agnathevar Bakaran & Mammo Muchie15 (2006) explains the impressive advances of information and communication technologies (ICT) in some Asian counties have led some people to proclaim a fundamental change in the world economy. It is still relatively difficult to find reliable information about the changes taking place in China or any other

developing country. One of the many good features of this evaluation is that it takes into account the specific relationship of ICT with the wider social and economic system and the national system of innovation of each country. It give insight into the role of ICT and ICT policy in the most important emerging economies in the world especially India. Srinath Srinivasa 16(2006) stressed on te theme of power and power laws in particulars since it is these laws that will govern how the internet and information and communication technology are used and abused. The author investigates properties of frictionless, non-linear systems and shows how information affects us in a variety of ways. Tom J. van Weert & Arthur Tatnall (2005)17 projects international trends are observed in the following areas: learning in real-life situations; development of relationships with business and industry; and new forms of assessment. The papers in this book present a cross-section of issues in real life learning in which Information and Communication Technology (ICT) plays an important role. Some of the issues covered include: education models for real-life learning enabled by ICT; effective organization of a real-life learning environment; the changing role of the student; the changing role of educational institutions and their relationship with business and industry; the changing role of teachers and their use of ICT; and management of ICT rich education change.

R.K.

Bagga, Kenneth Keniston & Rohit Raj Mathur 18 (2005)

examined governance challenges and the pitfalls of ICT applications; citizen-centric governance; cyber laws and their implementation; the role of ICT in combating corruption; technological and human readiness to make e-governance a reality; conceptualizing successful ICT project for everyone; and ICT application in agriculture and in harnessing social capital and ensuring financial returns. Madanmohan & Lunita endoza 19 (2005) explains the flavour and implications of these fast paced developments by providing a

comprehensive, detailed and insightful look at the wireless scenario in the Asia-Pacific. It charts the growth of the wireless ecosystem across the region, highlights the valuable lessons learned by the pioneers, and contextualizes these themes with developments in other parts of the world including the US, Europe and India. James S.L. Yong 20 (2005) explains in detail about Brunei, China, Hon Kong, India, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. The author stresses on how each government administration has chosen to pursue their e-Government initiatives, extensive research and interviews with government leaders and practitioner has been done in context to e-governance.

Asian Development Bank 21 (2005) elaborates e-government strategy, and is rapidly expanding the use of ICT in governance by establishing online public services and digital collaboration between government ministries. However, successful implementation of e-

government remains a challenge. The Regional Workshop on Designing Egovernment for the poor assisted the participants to gain a better understanding of e-government, and building capacity for the planning and implementing e-government for the poor. Richard Heeks 22(2005) focuses on the implementation of egovernment systems. It explores activities such as feasibility studies, system analysis, system design, construction and marketing. The author explains e-government management issues such as the management strategy and projects; quality; people, money and policies; and dealing with political and ethical challenges. Sghirin Madon 23(2005) representing a significant step forward in the development of critical perspectives on the IS field, the Handbook draws together original contributions from leading authors who offer alternative sto the current mainstream approaches to IS research. In order to accommodated the various strands of critical understaidng, a broad range of views and theoretical standpoints are encompassed, thereby combining theory with practical applications, and offering a valuable source

of reference for this emerging are of research especially a research paper on e-government in India. United Nations24 (2005)illustrates good practice, including case studies from China, India, Malaysia, Nepal and Thiland, relating to initiatives to expand ICT infrastructure capacity to promote access to ICT for all rural and poor people with the countries of the Asia and pacific region. These case studies include descriptions of appropriate technology, financial mechanisms, related ICT policies and the role stakeholders. Sumit Ropy25 (2005) emphasizes that increasingly non state institutions, as opposed to the state, are transforming economies. The author also highlights the critical need for development regions to shapes ICT which can stimulate development and usher in the information age. Enabling instant communication over vast distances and in real time, ICT has far-reaching implications for transnational relationships. Commonwealth Secretariat26 (2004) illustrates various civil serives, which have undergone redical change in scope, organization and approach rendering a revision timely. These re-issued Country Profiles continue to be an accessible and valuable source of reference which attempt to both describe and analyze the often tumultuous and of key

controversial public sector reforms which have taken place in contributing countries since 1995. Mark Turner and David Hulme 27 (2004) provide a comprehensive introduction to the public policy process and public management in development countries. The authors review the public management system in the developing world with varied case studies which includes the use of Information and communication Technologies for the help of the poor. Economic and Social Commission for Asia28 (2004) focuses on the Building e-Community Centres for Rural Development Workshop coorganized by UNESCAP and Asian Development Bank Institute, which examined the various issues relted to Community e-Centre in the Asia and the Pacific region. The purpose is to share good practices and provide models for successful development and operation of these centres. Subhash C. Bhatnagar29 (2004) provides key insights and practical guidelines on: ways to successfully implement e-government projects; selecting application areas, project designs, strategies and their

implementation; benefits and impact of e-government on public sector reform, poverty reduction and empowerment methodology for evaluating egovernment projects; and overall strategy formulation.

Mark Warschauer30 (2004) examines the ways in which differeing access to technology contributes to social and economic stratification or inclusion. The author takes a global perspective, presenting case studies from developed and developing counties, including Brazil China, Egypt, India, and the United states. Kenneth Keniston & Deepak Kumar 31 (2004) examines at length the history, nature and aspects related to the digital divide in India. It has examined in detail the social, economic and political aspects affecting it. Alongside the optimism and hype surrounding the information age, it was noted by the authors that a vast majority of the people remained untouched by this revolution. A digital divide come to be recognized between the rich an the powerful, which are part of the information age and the poor and powerless, which are not. Simon Tay & Maria Seda 32 (2003) has identified strategies and sharing experiences of countries raging from Indonesia and Thailand to Honk Kong and Singapore. It would be a valuable resources for countercorruption agencies and government leaders, examining common challenges and shared experiences, and laying of tested strategies and solutions. Karen Mossberger, Caroline J. Tolbert & Mary Stansbury33 (2003) explained digital dividewhich falls between those who have and can

afford the latest in technological tools and those who have neither in our societyis indisputable. Virtual Inequality redefines the issue as it explores the cascades of that divide, which involve access, skill, political participation, as well as the obvious economics. Computer and internet access are insufficient without the sill to use the technology, and economic opportunity and political participation provide primary justification for realizing that this inequality is a public problem and not simply a matter of private misfortune. Jeffrey James 34 (2003) examines the global digital divide- the extent to which information technology is benefiting developed as opposed to developing counties has already established itself as the single most pervasive theme of the twenty-first century. The author explores some of the ways in which this divide can be overcome both within and between nations. Employing a rigorous analytical framework, the author bases his analysis on the concept of international technological dualism. James S. L. Yong 35 (2003) examines e-government in Asia, with special reference to nine economies Brunei, China, Hong Kong, India, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand and to understand how each government administration has chosen to pursue their e-government initiatives. The material is based on extensive research and interviews with government leaders and practitioners.

A. Kumar 36 (2002) explains the growth of Computers and the Information explosion are today relatives in our social and economic institutions. The purpose is to provide fundamental knowledge to enable one to participate in the development and use of information systems in modern organizations. The author elucidates variety of information requirements and the sophisticated ways in which these requirements are satisfied in modern organizations. Vivek Sood 37 (2001) stresses upon the need of cyber laws in the new era of cybernetic state as there are number of violations occurring as well as public servants are being trained to impart good governance through e-governance. The e-governance will remove the red tapism occurring in the day to day functioning of the government offices as well as reduce corruption as there would be more transparency. Akshay Joshi 38 (2001) provides a holistic analysis of the impact of the information revolution on the three pillars of national power: political, economic and military power. The book concludes that India can claim real success in exploiting the information revolution only if ti can bridge the digital divide. Therefore, it is important to use IT for developmental purposes. Srinivas R Melkote and Sandhya Rao 39 (2001) examines the role of the communication and presents fresh perspective and approaches to

understanding communication as well as the implications of the everchanging and regional communication landscapes. Arvind Singhal and Everett M Rogers40 (2001) explain the journey of Indian from bullock carts to Cyber Marts. It includes the human Endeavour and give important statistical information with a multi dimensional view of the revolution. It discusses the Indias path to development through normalization, in which new communication

technologies are harnessed for socio-economic advancement. Subhash Bhatnagar & Robert Schwae 41 (2000) traces the history of ICT use in rural India, examines some of the problems that have afflicted the implementation of rural development programmes, at the same time showing how ICT application could help overcome them, assesses the early efforts in ICT use, proposes a scheme by which to classify ICT applications.

Objectives of the Study

In benchmarking state initiatives, four independent frameworks of analysis seem possible. These frameworks have been presented as possible ways to look at governments progress and are exploratory.

Assessing the e-readiness of Punjab state and Chandigarh in Information and communication technology. Assessing the stated commitment through IT policy and actual application by governments of ICT tools toward reaching development goals. Applying the lens of good vovernancethe cornerstones of equity, accountability, transparency, participation, responsiveness, strategic

vision, and rule of law- to what is happening on the ground.

Research Methodology
For completing the research works both primary and secondary data will be taped. Interview method/ Questionnaire method will be applied to elicit views of selected sample of citizens belonging to various fields including Agriculturist, Government officer, Teachers, Businessmen, rural population including illiterate and officers working on behalf on the administration as well as private partners in the e-governance programmes in Pujab. The selected sample will include the elected members of parliament and state legislative assembly of Punjab through random sampling.; A random sample of offices belonging to All India Servies (IAS), Punjab Civil Services (PCS), PUNJAB INFOTECH, Department of Information

Technology (DIT) and National Informatics Center (NIC) Punjab region, who are actively participating in the policy making and implementing the information and communication technology programmes in Punjab for effect e-government, will be taken.

Tentative Cauterization
1. 2. 3. Introduction E-governance Initiatives in India E-governance in Punjab and Chandigarh: Initiatives and its implementation. 4. Role of information and communication technology in egovernance and its impact and citizens. 5. Conclusion.

CHAPPTER-2
e-GOVERNANCE INITIATIVES IN INDIA

Reinventing public institutions is Herculean work. To succeed, you must find strategies that set off chain reactions in your organization or system, dominoes that will set all others falling. In a phrase, you must be strategic. By strategy, does not mean detailed plans. There are no algorithms to follow to reinvent government, no step-by-step progression to which you must slavishly adhere. The process is not linear, and it is certainly not orderly. Things rarely go as planned; re-inventors must

constantly adjust their approaches in response to the resistance and opportunities they encounter. Rather, by strategy, I mean the used of key leverage points to make fundamental changes that ripple throughout the bureaucracy, changing everything else. Reinvention is large-scale combat. It requires intense, prolonged struggle in the political arena, in the institutions of government, and in the community and society. Given the enormity of the task and the resistance that must be overcome, the reinventors challenge is to leverage small resource into big changes. Being strategic means using the levels available to you to change the underlying dynamics in a system; in a way that changes everyones behavior. To use but one example for former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher did not start out with a full-blown strategy to reinvent the British state, She came into office in 1979 determined to make it smaller, privatize many functions, and force the bureaucrats to be more efficient. But unlike her American counterpart, Ronald Reaga, she learned from the failure of her jam the bureaucrats approach. She also had more time in office. In her third term, she began to apply a consistent philosophy of extending choice and competition to public services and decentralizing authority so providers had the flexibility to respond to their customers needs.

Information & Communication Technology

ICTs (Information and Communication Technology) are effectively showing new dimensions to old institutional setups. There is a reinforced thrust for an informed and participatory citizenry for efficient e-governance. It goes without saying that impact of ICT on institutional changes is fast spreading across the boundaries of social and political arrangements of societies. When computers were first developed around sixty years back, the primary purposes for which they were used were scientific computing and cryptanalysis (i.e. breaking codes used by enemy forces in

communication) during the Second World War. With the commercial availability computers and the realization that computers could be used for other applications, banks and insurance companies also started using these for speeding up their operations. When mainframe computers started gaining popularity in the late 1950s and 1960s, many of the governments round the world also started using these for imporoving their efficiency. The typical applications included analyzing census data, personnel management, land records, project monitoring, accounts, inventory control and economic modeling. These were mostly installed in the headquarters of department with centralized computing facilities, requiring large investments and were expensive to maintain.

Over the last few decades, the dovernment of relatively inexpensive personal computer which can communicate with each other through the Internet has opended up near vistas for widespread application in almost every field of human activity. The developed countries have already made considerable progress in widespread use of information technology (IT) in increasing the efficiency of operations of government machinery and in making it much easier for citizens to access information and interact with government. It is only during the last few years that the developing counties have started exploring the great potential of IT in improving the quality of governance. E-Governance is the application of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for delivering Government Services, exchange of information, communication transactions integration various stand-alone systems and services between Government and Citizens (G@C), Government and Business (G2B) as well as back office processes and interactions within the entire government frame work. Through the eGovernance, the Government services will be made available to the citizens in a convenient, efficient and transparent manner. The government being the services provider, it is important to motivate the employees for delivering the services through ICT. To achieve this, the Government employees are being trained on technology and started realizing the

advantage of ICT. The aim is to make them through with e-Governance applications and responsive to the technology driven administration.

The potential of ICT in impacting the live of rural poor in a variety of ways is now being widely recognized. Recognition of the potential comes from a few successful tele-center pilots in some developed and developing countries.1 Many e-government applications demonstrate the efficiency with which services can be delivered to the rural poor.2

e-districts
West Godavri-Rural e-Seva
Project Objective: Establish a sustainable service delivery model, wherein the government services are delivered to the citizen through a single window system, accessible at close proximity.

Value to Citizen: (a) Services delivery centre located at close proximity to the citizen thereby enhancing convenience (b) Reduce citizen interaction with the Government functionary / office for a service and c) Evolve these e-Seva centre into single stop shops for other routine citizen needs.

Services
Issue of Certificates: Caste, Income, Rs. 10 Residence, Integrated Posting of Grievances Download of applications/ information like mandi rates Acceptance of electricity payments Computer collaboration aided with education Azim Rs. 5 static Rs. 2

Charges

bill Rs. 2 per bill in Rs. 2 per child per month

Premji

Foundation by designating the local schools to the collocated e-Seva center Co-location of general facilities like, photocopying, fax/STD/ISD, internet Browsing lamination and binding works etc to augment the revenue of the center

Implementation Highlight:
Front-end automation where services requests are acdepted. As the citizen kiosk was critical to success, effective model was envisaged and enforced without leaving this to the choice of the private entrepreneur. 46 rural e-Seva centers at the rate of one per Mandal was established and augmented by another 150 RSDPs across the district. Minimal computerization of the backend departments as the project did not do away with the manual backend processing and the paper work involve. As services are completely data driven, the onus was on the citizen to obtain necessary authorization of basic data that was entered into the MPHS database, if the same was not available. Project was conceived in Sep 2002 and the first version of the model started working from Jan 2003 with a limited set of services. Application was developed by NIC and is being supported and maintained by NIC.

 Coordination Committee was formed to work out the financial scheme, facilitate the establishment of kiosks and provide transparency.

Success factors
Availability of certified and department owned MPHS data has alleviated challenges like backend enablement, process

reengineering and change management. Championing of the entire initiative from visioning to implementation by the District Collector leveraged the necessary support from all quarters and ensured sustainability. Empowerment of the Mandal Revenue offices (Mandal is a revenue administration unit at par with Block in other states) for delivery of services related to the Revenue Department. Involvement of key stakeholders such as self-help groups and leveraging subsidies from other programmes to provide financial viability to the establishment of the initial infrastructure. Citizen awareness and appreciation of the services had put the onus on the department to sustain the services levels and explore enhancements.

 The maturity of service delivery ensures sustenance of te processes and delivery model.

Thiruvarur-e-district
Value to Citizen
The entire land record transactions have been made online thus providing up-to-date electronics records related to land purchase recorded in the Taluk and village land record registers. Birth and death certificates provided with 10 minutes for the period 1997-2001. The acknowledgement and follow-up of Public grievance redressal mechanism was facilitated through a software application to enable citizen response within two week. Prompt dispatch of Old Age Pensions (OAP) to beneficiaries within the first week of each month. Disbursal of scholarships to eligible Pre & Post Matric students within one week after receipt of fund allocation from Government. Annual accounts settlement (Jamabanthi) completed on time, every time.

 Monitoring of development programmes.

Services Charges Rs. Mutation related documents for land 20 purchases at Taluk and village Cultivation and harves certificates 20 (Adangal extract) (Issue of RoR) Other land record extract Issue of certificates/ cards Citizen Grievance redressal Social Welfare Scheme (Pensions and Scholarships) 10 10 Nil Nil

Implementation Highlights
The functional specifications and solution development was carried out under the personal initiative of the then District Collector and his team. The district had set up a software development centre in the DCs office, employing over 30 outside software professionals. Software was developed approximately in 12 months. Staff training was provided at the centralized training facility on a continuous basis and majority of the training sessions ware

conducted by the senior officials including the District Collector himself. To administer the Taluk/ Block computer systems, clerical grade employees from each of the 20 offices volunteered to undergo training to act as software administrators. Two staff members per office were indetified for intensive training on serve administration. Funds ware mobilized from various sources and schemes such as Members of Parliament Local area development Programe

(MPLADP) and MLA Constituency development fund. No State support was provided. Total funding for this project was Rs. 2 Cr for infrastructure; development and associated tools were provided gratis by a leading IT vendor, IBM.

Success factors.
1. of all the model districts visited, Thiruvarur system seems to be the most comprehensive in terms of functional coverage. The eGovernance applications are characterized by simplicity and effectiveness Requirements. 2. Designing a roject Plan with well defined milestones is necessary for successful e-Governance outcomes including development and training. The collector was the de facto Project Champion. which is a clear reflection of clarity in

3.

Continuity of Financial Support is essential for implementation of e-district. Currently there is an urgent requirement for up gradation of the software and computing infrastructure for up gradation of the software and computing infrastructure that have hithereto become obsolete and to support software maintenance.

4.

Data related to various applications were build ground-up through actual involvement of the officials which have been critical from the standpoint of data quality and ownership of data. But there are no standards governing data that would be a key requirement for building capacity/ replication.

5.

To manage change effectively (a) a permanent facility for training of users was established at the collectorate and (b) a Bilingual database interface (Tamil/English) was put in place.

6.

Creation of Public Awareness through public grievance redressal camps. Eight such camps were conducted in wedding halls and about 3055 citizens were provided on-the-sport sanctions for various requirements.

Rural development Initiatives

Since time immemorial, India has been a land of village communities. With more than 75 percent people living in rural areas, no development can be successful unless in focuses on rural areas and rural people. In 1986, NIC introduced IT to facilitate planning, monitoring and exchange of information between various agencies in the area of Rural Development administration.

RuralSoft
Rural Soft is a solution that helps in monitoring the monthly progress of various poverty alleviation schemes sponsored by MoRD and SRDs. Rural Soft3 is, in fact, the more sophisticated version of what was popularly known as CRISP software, undertaken under the Computerized Rural Information System. Project (CRISP), launched by MoRD, as early as 1986. The software was designed and developed by NIC and distributed to all State Rural Department. Since then, the software has responded to may changes in the domain as well as technology. It finally evolved to what is today known as Rural Soft.

Below Poverty Line Survey Computerization

BPL survey is conducted every five years to capture the information regarding families below poverty line. The survey is conducted as per directions from the department. The survey data captured through BPL survey software4 is used by planners in Ministry of Rural Development and State rural development, by citizens (Particularly, the rural poor) to see if they are part of the BPL list and hence eligible for various benefits offered by the government and by many other departments of the Central and State Government.

Panchayati Raj Informatics5

The Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) introduced through the 73rd Amendment Act, 1992 was a landmark in decentralized development as it envisions grass root peoples participation in the process of planning, decision making, implementation and delivery. The Ministry of Panchayati Raj, launched a National Panchayat Portal (NPP) (http://panchayat.nic.in) in December 2004, which contains a portal framework of State PR, all zilla Parishads, all Block Panchayats and all Village Panachayats in the country with the web-site of the ministry acting as the gateway home page.

PriaSoft-Panchayati Raj Administration Software

PriaSoft6, is umbrella software catering to the administrative needs of PRIs and also serving the common man. This software solution also helps in monitoring the accounts of Panchayati Raj Institutions by State RD/MoRD and Comptroller & Auditor General (CAG) Office, thereby bringing about transparency in Panchyati Raj accounting. The receipts/ expenditure details are available on the web for all, including village citizens. Current implementations of PriaSoft include: PriaSoft(Panchlekha Madhya Pradesh, Orissa =

http://ori.nic.in/priasoft, Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh)

- for Accounting

PriaSoft- Aasthi (Karnataka) Property Tax module for Gram Panchayats PriaSoft- e-Panchayat (Andhra Pradesh) Internet based services for

Birth and Death Registrations, House Tax Assessment Collections, Trade Licenses, Old Age Pensions, works Monitoring, Financial Accounting, MIS for Panchayat Administration are all being executed in the computerized ePanchayat system. Additional services such as market prices and agricultural extension advice will also be provided to the citizens of the village from e-Panchayat. This project is being implemented in Ramchandrapuram Gram Panchayat, Denduluru, Pedapadu in West Godavari District, Anantapur Rural Village Panchayat.

This project is going to be extended to all villages in Andhra Pradesh7 in phased manner and can also be extended to other States by appropriate adaptation.

Gyandoot
The facility of internet in Dhar8 district which is connecting rural cyber cafes, is catering to the every day needs of the masses. The web site of GYANDOOT is an extension of Gyandoot internet, for giving global access. Some of the services provided to rural people through kiosks set up in the villages of the rural district include Commodity/ Mandi Marketing Information System, Income Certificate, Domicile Certificate (mool niwas), Caste Certificate, Driving License, Rural matrimonial (Vivah Sambandh), rural Market (Gaon ka Bazaar), Rural News Paper (Gram Samachar) Advisory module (Salakhar), E-education Employment news etc.

SERVICES
In all the Soochanalaya9 villages, three meetings each were organized with the villagers where in-depth participatory appraisal was

dopne. The design of the services provided was a result of this interactive exercise and was based upon the advice and the felt needs of the villagers. In these meeting, it was learned thatr due to lack of information regarding the proper mandi rates not only in the local mandis but in the benchmark mandis (where the local mandi trader sells his own purchases), the farmers are unable to get the best price for their agricultural produce. Villagers also informed that copies of land records are difficult to obtain since the patwari is often on tour and one patwari is responsible for several villages. The villager needing a copy of the land records has to go out in search of the partwari who may or may no tbe available on that particular day at his headquarters. For small complaints or for giving applications, people had to go to Block, Tahsil or District headquarters which resulted in waste of time, money and potential livelihood earnings. From the Soohanalayas, rates of grains and vegetables of nearly a dozen mandis, copies of revenue maps or khasras or B1 may be obtained. In addition, income certificates, caste certificates, domicile certificates, demarcation applications, applications for obtaining landholders loan passbook (rin pustika) etc. may be sent on-line. On the preparation of the desired certificate/ rin pustika, the information will be sent through email to the concerned Soochanalaya. These can be prepared in a maximum period of 10 days although the attempt will be to provide them much

earlier.

Complaints

regarding

Government

schemes/

programmes/

institutions/ employees may also be sent through the net and in a maximum period of seven days, preferably less, reply regarding their disposal will be sent back to the concerned Soochanalaya10. Gram Daak: emailing software which is all set to become the Hotmail for villagers. Working in their local language, it has all the features and facilities of a state of the art web based email. In addition to this, Gram Daak also has a client version which works locally at the Gyandoot Soochanalayas end has message queuing facility. One getting connected it transfers all the mails in the out box to the Gyandoot server and receives the incoming ones stored therein. This reduces the burden on the perennially disturbed telephone connectivity.

Expansion in availability of rates for more mandis and more crops: State Mandi Board has begin supplying rates of wheat on
the Gyandoot internet for another 23 mandis over and above the initial 13 mandis whose rates were provided earlier for varieties and crops. The Board will be adding information of rates of other varieties/ crops also soon for the new 23 mandis. Rates of 9 more varieties/ crops have been added over and above the initial 15. Thus, rates of 24 crops/ varieties form 13 mandis and rate of wheat from 36 mandis are now available.

Government

sponsored

loan

project

preparation

and

submission: Villagers who seek government sponsored loans may gent

a project report prepared for occupations in the approved shelf of loan projects at the nearyby Soochanalaya as and submit them their itself with necessary supporting documents for forwarding to banks/lending agency in case of the Swarnjayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana (SGSY- the recast IRDP). The citizen need not hunt professionals for project preparation or chase files from extension workers to desks, officies and sponsoring committees. The correct project may be prepared, approved and forwarded to the bank/lening agencies with reply assured within two week by visiting a Soochanalayas for a modest for a modest fixed fee of Rs. 25. It is planned to cover all other government loan schemes too. Shelf of 96 projects is already available on the internet.

Information regarding government programmes:

Detailed information regarding over a hundred government

programmes is now available on the Gyandoot intranet.

Mandi Information Centre11:- From 22nd June Dhamnod mandi

has been linked with gyandoot. Besides hourly only mandi rates it

will provide loacal weather report and information/ documentaries of new techniques and technologies in agriculture/ horticulture or allied activity will be available. The farmers can see them from a 29 television put up in the centre of mandi. It is estimated that around 800-1000 farmers will be benefited from this facility every day. The project will eventually link and create similar facility in Dhar, Badnawar and Rajgarh mandi as well.

Vaivahiak: An online matrimonial application for the villagers to

choose the right match for a prospective birde/groom. Every every entry from a Soochanalaya by a villager gets added on to a centralized Dhar database which when searched would provide accurate results. The program has been generatd by keeping the parameters of the villages in mind. The Patidar and Jain samaj have already agreed to place their matrimonial here. Gyandoot, out model for e-government pioneered in Dhar district,

provides over 17 citizen services through kiosks amanaged by entrepreneurs based on the Internet. This has now been replicated in 12 more districts. It also won the Stockholm Challenge Award. Out efforts view IT as one fundamentally intended to improve basic services for the average citizen 12.

Bhoomi
Bhoomi project is an attempt made by Karnataka State Government for Computerization of Land Records. This project is sponsored jointly by Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India and State Government of Karnataka. Under the Bhoomi E-Governance project all 20 million land records of 6.7 million land owners in 176 taluks of Karnataka have been computerized. This systems works with the software called BHOOMI designed fully in-house by National Informatics Center, Bangalore 13.

Important Features of BHOOMI

This software provides for printing of land records as and when required. It incorporates process of online updation to ensure that the RTCs, provided to the farmers are in sync with the time. All the mutations to the land records database are done on the computer itself so as to ensure that data on computer remain current with time. It incorporates the state of the art bio-logon metrics system from Compaq, which authenticates various users on the Bhoomi software

on the basis of fingerprints. This ensures that nobody can hack the system by imitating other users. This software also has the provision of scanning of original mutation orders of the revenue inspector (who is the authorized person to pass orders in the mutations in the field) and notices served on interested parties. Both documents are scanned to ensure that not only responsibility can be fizzed on Officials by showing the original documents signed by them but also to ensure that the interested parties do not claim in the court that they were not served with the notice before effecting the mutation. The software enables the administrators to generate various reports based on type of soil, land holding size, type of crops grown etc. this Information would enable administrators to take informed policy decision14.

Components of Bhoomi
There are 3 main components in Bhoomi System. The computer centre where mutation and updation are one in online fashion. It includes finger print authentication and scanning of important documents to ensure robust and secured system. Most of

the components of the Computer Centre are funded under the Central Scheme. Land Record kiosk from where the farmers can collect the copy of their record by paying Rs. 15. They can also lodge request for mutation to their land records. The Kiosk is fully funded by State Government. Touch Screen Kiosk where farmers can see their land related information without any bodys intervention or help.

Benfits of Bhoomi
Farmers Farmers can quickly get their land records from Kiosks and are protected from harassment and extortion. As against time delay of 3 to 30 days they now get their records in less than 2 minutes. No overhead cost is to be incurred. No application is required to be submitted at the kiosk. The records are authentic and legible. Use of biometrics authentication system for updation of records have freed farmers form the worry of probable manipulation of their recrds by some times some unscrupulous officials.

Reduction in processing time for mutation

Farmers can lodge application for mutation (change in land title) to their land records at the mutation kiosks, get acknowledgement for the same and can monitor the progress using touch screen kiosks available in some Bhoomi centers. They would then get their updated land record in a fixed time frame without the need of approaching any authority. As against earlier time. Of 70-200 days, mutation would now require less than 35 days.

Online tracking of mutation status.

Farmers can also get the official status report of their request for mutation which would let them know the stage at which their request is pending. This status report would help them in enforcing their right of getting the record mutated in the prescribed time.

Easy access to Farm Credit

Online connectivity to banks would ensure farm crdit to farmers in less than 5 days as against 25-30 days in manual system.

Ease in case of legal matters.

It would be easier for the farmers to pursue land related litigation in the court.

Administrators
Ease of maintenance and updation of land records docments. In manual system land records updation used to get delayed by as high as 1-2 years in some cases. Now it would always be in sync with time.

Quick and easy access to Land records.

Support for development programs, based on valuable land records data like various crops grown in a village or a sub district, the fertilizers and pesticide requirement in a season etc to Departments like Agriculture, Industries and Planning. Such data in earlier system became available to departments only after 2-3 years. It is now available almost immediately.

Quick and easy access to Land records for analysis purpose.

Support for development programs, based on valuable land records data like various crops grown in a village or a sub district, the fertilizers and pesticide requirement in a season etc to Departments like Agriculture, Industries and Planning. Such data in earlier system became available to departments only after 2-3 years. It is now available almost immediately.

Ease of monitoring Government Lands.

Monitoring of Government lands and prevention of their

encroachments. Lack of monitoring had costed a reported loss of Rs. 25 billion to State Government by way of officials tampering with records.

Others
For Financial Institutions, Online Farm credit related activities.
Online connectivity to financial institutions would help banks in planning for their farm credit related activities. In manual system they worked on 2 years old data or just guessed them farm sector requirement.

Information availability for Private Sector.

The Department of Revenue in Karnataka has computerized 20 million records of land ownership of 6.7 million farmers. In the manual system, land records were maintained by 9.000 Village Accountants, each serving a cluster of 3-4 villagers. Farmers had to pay bribes and make several visits to the accountant (took3-30 days) to get a copy of the RTC a document needed primarily for obtaining bank loans. Land records in the custody of Village Accountants were not open for public scrutiny. Mutation requests15 had to be field with the Village Accountant. A Revenue Inspector was authorized to update the record after a process of enquiry spanning 30 days. In practice, however, it could take 1-2 years for the records to be updated. Now a signed copy of the RTC can be obtained online by providing the name of the owner or plot number at computerized Bhoomi kiosks in 187 taluk offices, for a fee of Rs. 15. A second computer screen faces the clients to enable them to see the transaction being performed. A farmer can file a mutation request at the kiosk and check the status on a Touch Screen provided on a plot basis in some kiosks. If the revenue inspector does not complete the mutation within 45 days, a farmer can now approach a second person in the district who has been designated to authorize a mutation. Now, mutation requests are to be handled strictly on a frist-come-first-served basis. These measures limit opportunities for

collecting bribes. Operators of the computerized system are made accountable for their decisions and actions by using a bio-login system that authenticates every log-in through a thumb print. In the last one year nearly 90,000 mutation requests have been made and the monthly collection of fee has varied from Rs. 7.9 million to Rs. 14.4 million 16. Data on crop survey is currently collected manually and updated I the taluka database in a batch mode three times a year. In a pilot experiment, a locally designed handheld computer (Simputer) has been provided to 200 village accountants for capturing the crop data live in the field. Village Accountants have found it easy to learn the operations of the Simputer. Bhoomi demonstrates the benefits of making government records more open so that citizens are empowered to challenge arbitrary action. It also illustrates how automation can be used to take discretion away from civil servants at operating levels. Independent evaluation studies have shown that Bhoomi has significantly reduced corruption and improved service delivery.

PRAGATI
NIC, Assam State Centre has designed and developed, PRAGATI an umbrella of e- Governance application for implementation in the

district administrations officers of government of Assam17. it provides a useful and standard package of e-Governance applications for efficient delivery of services in several areas of district administration.

e-PANCHAYAT- Panchayat Raj the e-way

e-Panchayat is a comprehensive suite of Panchayat application conceptualized, designed and developed by NIC Andhra Pradesh, to effectively solve the information management problems at the village level. As a part of its e-Governance initiatives, e Panchayat has been designed taking into consideration all the information and knowledge management requirements in a gram pancyahat. The 1992 Panchayat Raj Act of the central Government and the success stories of the Gram Panchayats n various state in the country are taken into consideration while developing e-Panchayat. The orders issued by the Government of Andhra Pradesh regarding the Village Secretariats and the functions of the village secretary besides the elected representatives of the Grampanchayat are all considered in this package. Thus ePanchayat fits well into the information systems at village level. E-Panchayat benefits the Citizens, the Elected Representatives, the Gram Panchayat and other village level officials, the Administrators and Planners at the district and state level, also knowledge

workers and the researchers. Separate user centric modules are made available, taking into consideration the requirement of these main stake holders. Information on different aspect is made available to the citizen in the purview of Gram Panchayat to make the citizen empowered with knowledge, through e pancyahat website. The Web site is an integrated environment of gram panchayat providing access to the various functions carried out by gram panchayat in offering citizen services and also aiding the local administration. Downloading of application forms, information on citizen charter, Acts and Government orders, panchayat profile,

Government programs, Welfare schemes, Development works, Status on applications submitted and tax dues, Grievance registration and status enquiry, budget information and links to important sites. The information services are available for functions such as Births and Deaths; House Tax; Trade Licenses; Pension schemes; Works Land Records; Marriages; etc.

LOKMITRA (Infotech for the Masses)

The Government of Himachal Pradesh has taken the benefits of Using Information Technology (IT) in Governance at the doorstep of the general public, especially those living in distant rural areas. This Web-site enable Government Citizen Interface aims at making people aware of

government policies and programmes, and also providing an interface to interact with various government functionaries. The NIC, Himachal Pradesh, has been identified as the E-Governance Wing by the State government, for designing and developing necessary software and implementing the project. The project envisages various direct/ indirect social as well as economic benefits to the rural masses such as: Better dissemination of government information at the remotest corner, resulting in better awareness among rural masses about various Government Schemes and bringing in transparency. Saving in time and cost of people visiting District headquarters time and again for getting information, lodging complaints and inquiring their status etc. Reduction in response time by the concerned departments and increase in their accountability to people of the State. Virtual Extension Counters for the Government, by way of using these Centers for getting the departmental Data entered and transmitted from time to time. A platform for the people to interact with each other on mutual interest e.g., matrimonial sales/ purchases etc.

 Additional income opportunities form Citizen Information Centers by using them for General Training, Word Processing and Data Entry jobs, and extending Internet Access. Employment generation by opening up on Citizen Information Centers throughout the State in the private sector. Facilitating the growth of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) throughout the State. In order to visualize the concept, it was decided by the State Government to implement the project on a pilot basis in one of the districts on Intranet. Accordingly, the project was started on a pilot basis in district Hamirpur, funded by NABARD, as the first IT- Project of any State Govt. funded under RIDF scheme. The pilot peoject was formally launched by the Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh 18 on 08th May 2001. A district wide Intranet was created, by setting-up the Control Room (LokMitra Soochnalaya) in the Deputy Commissioner office at Hamirpur. The District Administration, in consultation with the Zila Parishad and Panchayats, identified 25 panchayats for setting up the Citizen Information Centres (LokMitra Soochna Soochanalaya19 (control Room at the Deputy commissioner office, Hamirpur).

Lokmitra Soochna Kendras

The Soochna Kendra (Citizen Information Centres) have been set up at 25 centrally located Panchayats. One unemployed youth has been sponsored by each of the concerned Panchayat for these Centres, named as Soochaks. The Soochaks have been provided with a Client Computer with a Printer, Modem and UPS. They ware also imparted necessary training at the district headquarters for accessing and using LokMitra Sofware. The Soochaks are required to deposit a security bond and fixed annual Registration charges with the district administration. The Services offered in the pilot implementation of the project are as follows: Classified complaints against the listed departments in a pre-defined format. For these classified complaints, the concerned department within 10 days assures a reply. Questions/ General Grievances from the given department, which are not as Classified Complaints, are to be replied within 30 days. Downloadable Forms the citizens need for various purposes e.g. driving license form, forms for getting various subsidies, ration card form etc. Vacancies are being publicized by various Government Department / Agencies, along with the application forms. Tenders being floated by PWD, Municipal Committee, IPH, DRDA etc. with complete job details, submission data, earnest

money, cost of work etc. Promotional Schemes from all Departments, with details e.g. how to take benefit, Forms to be filled etc.

HIM-BHOOMI
Initially in a Pilot Project in District Kangra, the Software was developed in Foxplux under UNIX. The computerization efforts involved were confined to products of the Jamabandi (Records of Rights) in order to give copies. In the twelve district of the state, the total numbers of tehsils are 109 and sub-division 50. Him-Bhoomi project has been implemented in 92 tehsil, Himris in 57 tehsils and E Praman in 88 tehsils of the state.

Table: District wise current status 20

District Total number of E-Praman Him Bhoomi Himris

Tehsils
Bilaspur Chamba Hamirpur Kangra Kinnaur Kullu LahualSpiti Mandi Shimla 4 10 6 19 6 6 3 16 17

Sub Div. Tehsils

2 6 3 8 3 3 3 6 7 2 10 5 12 6 6 3 11 17 4 9 6 12 6 5 3 16 14 2 6 1 12 0 1 2 6 17

Sirmour Solan Una State Total

10 7 5 109

3 4 2 50

7 5 4 88

7 5 5 92

1 5 4 57

HIM-BHOOMI
Form the experience gained from the initial implementation in Kangra Sirmaur district 21 of the state, comprehensive land records computerization system was developed. Technically the improvement started with development of the Software in Oracle 7.0 under UNIX instead of Foxplus under UNIX, because Oracle was more powerful Sofware and also improved the security of the data so essential to land records. The Software wa made more comprehensive by including all the main land records. Separate Software modules were envisaged for Shajra Nasb, Jamabandi and associated statement, Mutations, Khasra Girdawari Agricultural statistics and Kisaan Pass Books etc. Under this software, a Unique code is assigned to each individual appearing the extent of land possessed, which could be a basis for many e-governance applications. In addition to this, numerous inferences can be derived from analytical studies to be carried out on the basis of this Unique Code. For instance, person claiming to be a small farmer (but actually having scattered land at

numerous locations) can be easily identified. Similarly, extent of fragmentation of land and its impact on yield over the decades can be quantified. Moreover, a person enjoying different statuses illegally (e.g. a tenant and landowner at the same time) can be identified. This software facilitates mutation entry and generation of Nakal and Jamabandi. This software createds a complete MIS as it encompasses Minor Irrigation Census, Agriculture Census details there by helping the Department in smooth conduct of irrigation & agriculture census which are conducted after every five years. This may lead to substantial saving of effort and resources as much of the information related to it can be extracted from Him Bhoomi databases. In addition to it the new technology has helped in creating Revenue village code same as the census village code, hence, all the data can be correlated with the Land Records database to carry out various even micro level studies down to the individual level 22. This has helped in getting revenue documents within a shorter possible time as earlier 3-4 months were taken to get the same and made it cost effective.

Him Bhoomi Modules

The HimBhoomi software has different modules viz. Gram

Nideshika23, HimBhoomi-LaPort Module, imBhoomi-Mutation module and

HimBhoomi-ROR (Nakal) Distribution Module. This software has used the

old traditional Terminology viz. Khewat Number, Khatoni Number, Khasra Number, Min & Salam, Mortgage, Awaal/ Doaym/ Soyam.

Himris
The power of sub registrars have been vested in Naib-Tehsildar. The landholders leaving in far flung areas come to offices after spending hours to get as many service at the same time from a single trip. With the introduction of computerization of land records since 2005, e-governance related services, including certificates of different kinds issued on the spot and thus the whole process is run through Property Registration software24.

Objectives
The underline concept of implementing Himris, to provide benefit of ICT in the revenue system with following objectives: To provide timely and efficient service to the people in a effeicient and transparent manner Enforce the changes in the system uniformly.

 Tapping of leakages in the revenue to due under value of rates of stamp duty and registration. Better services to the citizens by providing them spot registration and single window service. Prevention of frauds like impersonation, professional witness and proxies by capturing of photographs of all the parties and witness on the spot. Better monitoring of revenue collection, evaluation and

implementation of policies and programme of the govt besides replacing non-uniform, person specific processes.

E-Praman
Various types of certificates viz. Bona fide Certificate, Rural Area Certificate, Indigent (Needy Person) Certificate, Domicile Certificate, Agriculturist Certificate, Character Certificate, SC/ST Certificate, Dogra Class, Minority Community, Other Backward Class Certificate, Income Certificate, Non-Employment, Backward Area Certificate and Legal Heir are issued by all the tehsildar and sub-divisional magistrate offices. To make the availability of these certificates easier, E-Praman has been introduced in Himachal Pradesh since 2005. This ICT system has helped

the citizens to get the same easily and thereby the state has also generated revenue on account of it. Also the Tehsil centre are becoming hub of e-governance centres where in various services like issuance of RoR Nakal, property registration are going on, it seemed appropriate to expand the scope of services from the Tehsil centres so that in one visit citizen may get as many services as possible. Also in 29 sub-divisions Pehal25 e-governance enters are already established and offering services like issue of driving license, vehicle registration, with the introduction of computerized system of issuance of certificates in these centres again the scope of services has been enlarged. The three components viz. HimBhoomi, Himris and E-Praman has been successfully implemented in all the district of the state. Under HimBhoomi 127124 nakals were issued, 64327 number of mutations attested in the field, 68473 mutations were entered 78233 mutation are pending 4820 villages for which next jamabandi generated and 1520 villages for which Khasra Girdawari printed. Under Himris 36494 registrations were made and under E-Praman 328796 various certificates were issued and the total revenue generated under three components was Rs. 94,09,054.

Impact of Revenue-Governance

The computerization of land record has brought efficiency and transparency in land revenue Administratin besides making the revenue record temper proof, leads to easy maintenance and fast updation. It has empowered the land holders to get their records easily. The earlier manual system was time consuming and having many hurles in getting the vital information for various purposes. This has also helped in obtaining a loan from bank, serves as a proof for getting various benefits under different government schemes, submission during court cases and requirement for seeking compensation and crop insurance during natural calamities. The ICT system26 allows better management by Divisional Commissioners, Collectors, tehsildars and lower level revenue officers in implementing the revenue lawss and by-laws. With this various reports can be generated easily and the data available with the revenue department can be timely submitted to various notional and international agencies for getting various project and schemes. ICT has also resulted in giving better services, hereby giving a better image of the Govt. The record keeping has also been better in comparison to the earlier manual system.

HimBhoomi-RoR (Nakal) Distribution Module

One of the main objectives of the land records computerization is to provide the Nakal to the general public without any inconvenience. With

the help of the software the information related to various requests are entered and printouts of RoR are given instantaneously. The main features of this module are 27. 1) Online & offline provision of issue of Records-of-rights

information. 2) Search facility to identify the owner is provided to identify the owner if the individual does not know the ownership rights/ details. 3) 4) Easy maintenance of cash received and nakals being issued. Easy supervision by Tehsildar with the help of various reports available in the software.

The documents for which Nakal will be available are as follows:

1. 2. 3. 4. Shajra Nasb (Genealogical Tree Jamabandi (Records of Rights) Wazib-Ul-arj (Customary Rights) Naksha Bartan (Forestry/TD Rights)

LOKVANI

Lokvani28 is a public private partnership E-governance program started with combined efforts of District Administration and National Informatics Centre (Technical care taker) in District Sitapur. The goal of this program is to provide accountable and transparent governance to district Sitapur, which has 88% rural population with 38.86% literacy rate. First physical interface to this system is 42 kiosk centres spread uniformly in district and continuously increasing in numbers. License for Kiosk centre, user name and password is given to existing Cyber cafes/ computer training institute in district by signing agreement between Lokvani and owner of cyber caf. This decision was taken to ensure the financial viability and the long-term sustainability of the kiosks and to generate employment for educated youth. People can access information regarding medical facility, Land Records, Arms license application status, GPG accounts of basic education teachers and can file complaint to District Magistrate by paying nominal fixed charges to Kiosk or by using short message service and Integrated Voice Response System29. DM forward these complaints to concern officer with guideline and deadline for action should be taken. These complaints travel through OFC in district head quarter and through mail or manually to officer which are working in remote area. Uneducated complainant can check the progress of work through kiosk centre. Success story of this system is not only supported by

national new paper and maganize but also by facts. More than 47,700 complaints registered in short duration of 14 months and more than 90% complaints had been disposed successfully. Complaint pending for last 33 years has been solved through Lokvani. In spite of 12.74% literate women, 10% complainants are women from rural who are unable to travel District head quarter. This system has generated awareness among uneducated rural peoples regarding various government schemes, government prescribed forms, details of development work in the district, lists of old age pensioners, lists of scholarship beneficiaries, Funds allotted in various government schemes, allotment of food grains to Fare price shop, allotments of funds to village, free medical services etc. Mid Day Meal, Food for Work and BPL (Below poverty line) are name of few schemes whose monitoring is done through Lokvani.

AKSHAYA
Akshaya, an innovative project30 implemented in the State of Kerala aimed at bridging the digital divide, addresses the issues of ICT access, basic skill sets and availability of relevant content. Quality ICT dissemination and service delivery facilities (Akshaya Centres) are set up within a mazsimum of 2 kilometers for any household and networked

leveraging entrepreneurship. Though originated as an initiative to address the backwardness of Malappuram district, Akshaya was conceived as a landmark ICT project by the Kerala State Information Technology Mission to bring the benefits of this technology to the entire population of the State. The moduls for this was establishment of grass roots level ICT centres at the Panchayat/ Municpal ward level. Today, Akshaya31 is acting as an instrument in rural empowerment and economic development. The project is a catalyst in creating massive economic growth and creation of direct and indirect employment in the State by focusing on the various facts of e-learning, e-transaction, egovernance etc. thus the project is having a long standing impact on the social, economic and political scenario of the State. The Akshaya centres in the State will now sell various products of public sector telecom major Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL). According to an official release, the 2,086 Akshaya centres will sell BSNLs India Telephone Cards, SIM cards for BSNLs mobile service, recharge coupons, CD-ROM directories and so on. BSNL and the Kerala Stat IT Mission recently signed a memorandum of understanding in this regard 32.

E-Choupal

ITCs Agri Business Division, one of Indias larges exporters of agricultural commodities, has conceived e-Choupal33 as a more efficient supply chain aimed at delivering value to its customers around the world on a sustainable basis. The e-Chupal facility is aimed at providing variety of information such as weather and soil conditions for the farming community34. The e-Choupal model34 has been specifically designed to tackle the challenges posed by the uique features of Indian agriculture, characterized by fragmented farms, weak infrastructure and the involvement of numerous intermediaries, among others. e-Choupal also unshackles the potential of Indian farmer who has been trapped in a vicious cycle of low risk taking ability-low investmentlow productivity weak market orientation low value addition low margin- low risk taking ability. This made him and Indian agribusiness sector globally uncompetitive, despite rich & abundant natural resources. Such a market-led business model can enhance the

competitiveness of Indian agriculture and trigger a virtuous cycle of higher productivity, higher incomes, enlarged capacity for former risk

management, larger investments and higher quality and productivity. Further, a growth in rural incomes will also unleash the latent demand for industrial goods so necessary for the continued growth of the

Indian economy. This will create another virtuous cycle propelling the economy into a higher growth trajectory. Launched in June 2000, e-Choupal, has already become the largest initiative among all Internet based interventions in rural India. eChoupal services today reach out to over 4 million farmers growing a range of crops- soyabean, coffee, wheat, rice, pluses, shrimp in over 40,000 villages through 6500 kiosks across ten states (Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Kerela and tamil Nadu). The problems

encountered while setting up and managing these e-Choupals36 are primarily of infrastructural inadequacies, including power supply, telecom connectivity and bandwidth, apart from the challenge of imparting skills to the first time internet users in remote and inaccessible areas of rural India.

BHOOMI
Bhoomi (meaning land) is the project of on-line delivery and management of land records in Karnataka 37. It provides transparency in land records management with better citizen services and takes discretion away from civil servants at operating levels.

The Revenue Department in Karnataka, with the technical assistance from national Informatics Centre (NIC, Bangalore, has built and operationalised the BHOOMI system throughout the state. The BHOOMI has computerized 20 million records of land ownership of 6.7 million farmers in the state38. BHOOMI has reduced the discretion of public officials by introducing provisions for recording a mutation request online. Farmers can now access the database and are empowered to follow up. In the BHOOMI project, a printed copy of the RTC can be obtained online by providing the name of the owner or plot number at computerized land record kiosks in 177 taluk offices, for a fee of Rs. 15. A second computer screen faces the clients to enable them to see the transaction being performed. A farmer can check the status of a mutation application on Touch Screen Kiosks. If the revenue inspector does not complete the mutation within 45 days, a farmer can now approach a senior officer person with their grievance. The Karnataka governments Bhoomi project has led to the computerization of the centuries- old system of handwritten rural land records. Through it, the revenue department has done away with the corruption ridden system that involved bribing village accountants to procure land records; records of

right, tenancy and cultivation certificates (RTCs). The project is expected to benefit seventy lakh villagers in 30,000 villages39. A farmer can walk

into the nearest taluk office and ask for a computer printout of his land record certificate for Rs. 15. He can also check details of land records on a touch-screen kiosk by inserting a two-rupee coin. These kiosks, installed at the taluk office, will provide the public with a convenient interface to the land records centre40. The Centres proposal to replicate Karnatakas Bhoomi project throughout the country reflects well on the State Government. Bhoomi, the self-sustaining e-governance project for the computerized delivery of rural land records is a novel project. It is will not only transform rural life but also help achieve the much-needed transparency in revenue administration, which is riddled with corruption and red tape. The credit for this revolutionary step shoul go to the Chief Minister, S.M. Krishna, who not only initiated the project but also kept up a sustained effort to implement it speedily41.

JUDIS NIC has brought out The Judgment Information System (JUDIS)42, consisting of complete text of all reported judgment of Supreme Court, High Courts of Delhi, AP, Jammu and Kashmir, Bombay, Madras, Goa, Allahabad, Guwahati and Tis Hazari Delhi District out. Judgments can be accessed through part name, Advocate, Data of judgment and more

importantly by free text search. This enables the users to retrieve all relevant judgments on a particular subject. As a result of this very useful service an ordinary litigant can find out precedents of a case on his/her own. It saves lot of time of judges and advocates in locating precedents as well as saves lot of space in maintenance of a law library.

RAJYA SABHA
The Upper House of Parliament has been actively involve in use of Information technology to make access to Parliament related information easier. A large number of applications have been developed and implemented, for the use of Members Parliament Secretariat as well as for the benefit of Public at large. The most up-to-date website of Rajya Sabha43 is the storehouse of million of pages of Information well classified in various heads and sub-heads. The Rajya Sabha website give information on Proceedings of Rajya Sabha, committees information, Business of the House, Debate held in the House, Parliament Questions and Answers, Status of Legislation, Information relating to various Committees of the House, Whos Who, Address of Members, Rules of Procedure of Rajya Sabha etc. The website in intended for governments,

legislative bodies in India and abroad, academic Institutions, Print and visual media, the general public and Non Resident Idnians.

LOK SABHA
Lok Sabha Secretariat has set up a state of the art computer and communication Centre in New Parliament Library Building. A dedicated Members Query Booth serves MPs for all their IT needs. NIC44 has developed a number of Computer based applications for the Lok Sabha Secretariat. The Website of Lok Sabha has been designed and developed by NIC. The majority of application running here are similar to the applications at the Rajya Sabha. Some important facilities provided include databases with information regarding question and answers and debates.

e-POST
The internet revolution has allowed rapid exchange of

communication through email. However, the internet has not reached most of rural India and other remote areas. To bridge this digital divide, and to bring the benefit of the revolutionary internet technology to people living in rural areas, Department of Posts has introduced e-post45. The e-Post was initially launched in five States on an experimental basis. In the wake of the

experience gained and the service has been launched on national basis. This project has been implemented by NIC on a turnkey absis. E-Post is a service under which printed or even handwritten massages of customers are scanned and transmitted as emil. At the destination offices, these messages are printed, enveloped and delivered through postmen like other letters to the respective postal addresses. For this purpose, e-Post centres46 have been set up in Post Offices covering all the districts and major towns. These e-Post centres are equipped with internet connection, computers and printers. However, e-Post service is not limited to the ePost centres only. It can be availed of from any Post Office. Inrrespective of whether a customer is in a metropolis or in a remote village, he can send and receive e-Post messages. The messages booked at Post Offices which are not the e-Post centres, are sent to e-Post centres for scanning and dispatch. Similarly, messages received at e-Post centres for areas beyond their delivery jurisdiction are printed and sent to concerned Post Offices for delivery in normal matter through postman. The current developmental process was creating linkage between the traditional postal systems with the modern techniques. Mobile phones, computers and other modern gazettes have outplayed the conventional mode of

communication. While the use of such communication systems could not

be negated for their respective importance in everyones likfe, the postal system could be made better by sing them47.

e-NAGARPALIKA
e-Nagarpalika is a comprehensive suite of software solutions for Urban Local Bodies which aims automation of all municipal functions. ENagarpalika attempts to provide improved Citizen Sercies; Accountability to Citizen; Streamline procedures; Monitor Revenues and Services. The eFacilities offered cover e- Payments; e- Registrations; e- Certificates; eSubmissions; e-Status; e-Alerts; e-Acknowledgements; e-Downloads. ENagarpalika derives its strength from standardization of the basic components patient to application, strict Act compliance, streamlining of

procedures, work flow automation, hierarchy-wise authenticity, online services, status, horizontal and vertical Integration, inter-module interface, cutting edge technology and strict security. The web site provides facilities for download of application forms, Information on citizen charter, Acts and government Orders, Municipality profile, Govt. programs, Welfare

schemes, Development works, Status on applications submitted and tax dues, Grievance registration and status enquiry, Budget information and links to important sites. The facility for Births and Deaths Ragistrations

covers capturing of event details; Registration of events; Issuance of Certificates; Name inclusion; Non availability Certificates; Registers; Statistics. The Property Tax and Vacant Land Tax options includes assessment as per Monthly Rental value and Capital cost; revised assessment; Revision petitions and Appeal petitions; Demand Collections; Warrants and Distraints; Write off and Temporary Remissions; Vacancy Remission; Exemptions; Title Transfers; Special Notice/ Endorsements/ Demand Notice; Registers / Field Books/ DCB/ Defaulters / MIS Reports. Other options include Trade Licences; water Tax and Water Tap Connections; Advertisement Tax; Building Permissions; Projects and Works Management; Grievance Redressal; Assets Inventory; Court Cases and Financial Accounting.

e-ASHA
NIC UP State Unit, Lucknow has evolved an integrated I.T. solution e-ASHA (Automated Service & Help for All) as a G2G and G2C application48. Using the services through e-ASHA, a citizen can get not only specific information of public utility from the Government departments, but can also pay different types of bills through eASHA kiosks/couters across the city. E-ASHA provides copy of Record of Right (Khatauni) at the

counter, and offers enquiries related to tax details, property valuation, vehicles registration, pension, public grievances, to being with. It also offers collection of payments against bills related to Trade Tax, House Tax, Water Tax, Road Tax etc. all at a single counter. Common user interface screens for each service displaying, or requiring inputs for department specific data during a transaction. Client/ server web-based interface for each service reaching out over the Internet to the comforts of citizens home /office Client/ Server web-based implementation requires provision of just a web-browser at the front-end a web/ data server at the back-end, with a dialup/ ISDN connectivity Uniform and minimal front end screens 49 requiring little operator training.

CHAPER-3
E-GOVERNANCE IN PUNJAB & CHANDIGARH: INITIATIVES AND ITS IMPLEMENTATION

E- governance initiative in Punjab and Chandigarh E-governance in Punjab

IT is a significant facilitator of successful governance, and can to a long way in touching the lives of the common man. In this chapter we analyze the technology and strategies behind e-governance initiatives that are benefiting the masses of Punjab. The value of IT is not truly realized unless it touches everyday lives. In an enterprise environment, IT should be able to percolate all the way from the senior executives to the bottom, and make the job easier even for a fourth class worker. Similarly, in a governance projects, IT should advance the lives of the masses. Introduction of E-Governance is the key to making information technology (IT) relevant to ordinary citizens. E-governance is a culture, which changes how citizens relate to governments as much as it changes how citizens relate to each other. It brings into view re-definition of needs and responsibilities.

According to Dataquest IDC e-governance Satisfaction Study, the state of Punjab is ranked at 16th for citizen satisfaction, whereas it has 5 th rank in e-readiness. It clearly shows that though the state has started leveraging ICT extensively to boost its social / educational infrastructure, but the

actual benefits have either not seeped into or are yet to impact common citizens. One the other side, overall business satisfaction ranks very closely to overall e-readiness at 6th rank. While the total number of active e-governance projects has increased there is still lot of room to ensure that the benefits reach the intended users in the quickest possible way.

The three pillars of success of e-governance are:

State Wide Area Network State Data Centers And Citizen Service Centers Government of Punjab is progressively implementing its egovernance projects by swiftly undertake development of state wide area network, state dta centers and citizen service centers. The Punjab State wide area network is PAWAN which according to Narinderjeet Singh1 ,Secretary Information Technology 193 (out of 196) Point of Presence (PoPs) in the state, including one at the state level, 20 at district level and 172 at Sub-division/ level have already been implemented. Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) is providing 2 Mbps bandwidth for this project throughout the network. Apart from this, 21 Video Conferencing Centres have also been setup under the project.

State Wide Area Network

A typical2 government department having an e-governance application requires the following: A delivery platform for e-Governance applications. A mechanism for fast internal communication. Increasd accessibility to services for the citizens and multiply usage. Carry progressively increasing data and applications. Speed up the transfer of information between employees in different locations and to allow them to share common files. Carriage of voice and data in an integrated manner rather than having separate networks for voice and data. Have a secure and reliable channel to transfer data across locations. To fulfill these requirements, implementation of a State Wide Area Network is required. State Wide Area Network (SWAN) has been acknowledge as an element of the core infrastructure for supporting e-governance initiatives. Government of Punjab is in process of establishing the Punjab State Wide Area Network (PSWAN). The Punjab government signed an agreement with HCL Info systems to establish Punjab State wide Area Network

(PAWAN). The Punjab State Wide Area Network (PAWAN) will serve as the backbone network for data, voice and video communications throughout the State.3 The Project PAWAN to be implemented at a total cost of Rs. 41.45 crores will connect 200 sites i.e., 20 districts, 179 SubDivisions & Blocks across in Punjab putting the state on the fast trac towards IT proficiency and would be implemented in 26 weeks time. The Network for Punjab Government will be an Integrated, fully manageable network enabling Citizen Services and effective e-governance that is key for any States development. Departments of Treasury & Accounts, Excise and Taxation, Land Records, Transport, Police, Municipal Corporations and DC Offices shall use this network immediately. This network shall provide seamless end-to-end connectivity for all Governmetn offices across the state. On the occasion of signing an agreement with HCL Infosystems to establish Punjab State Wide Area Network (PAWAN),4 Adesh Partap Singh Kairon, Minister for Information Technology said, The Punjab State Wide Area Network shall act as an information super highway it will be set up on build, own, operate and transfer basis for give years. PAWAN will follow a 3-tier structure through point of presence across various levels. PAWAN is envisaged as the vehicle for effective implementation of Electronic Governance.

As per the Punjab state government policy PAWAN is expected to cater to the information and communication requirements of the entire state government and its departments. The implementation of PAWAN will provide reliable, vertical and horizontal connectivity within the state administration to make the Government more productive by reducing communication cost and also a secure backbone for electronic transactions. PAWAN will endow efficient service management with a complete range of Government services and information. To facilitates citizens of government services it will take full advantage of convergence of communication technology. PAWAN will ensure that every citizen in the state has access to Government services and information whenever and wherever they need it in a cost efficient manner irrespective of the loction in the stat of Punjab. The Project PAWAN to be implemented will connect 2002 sites i.e., 20 districts, 179 Sub-Divisions & Blocks across in Punjab. PAWAN would follow a 3 Tier structure through Point of Presence (POP) across the various levels.

3-Tier structure of PAWAN through Point of Presence (PoP) across the various Levels are:

State Head Quarter (or State Network Centre (SNC) constitutes Tier I. District Head Quarter (or District Network Centre (DNC) constitutes Tier II. Sub Divisional Head Quarter (or Sub Division Network Centre (SDNC) and the Block Head Quarters (or Block Network Centres (BNC) constitutes Tier III. The minimum bandwidth for PAWAN at each tier shall be of 2Mbps. Departmental offices of Government of Punjab shall now be connected to these Points of Presence (PoP) of PAWAN as Horizontal Office. 50 horizontal offices shall be connected to State Head Quarter (Tier I), 20 Horizontal offices shall be connected to District Head Quarter (Tier II) and 10 Horizontal offices shall be connected to Sub Divisional Head Quarters and block Head Quarters (Tier III) Network Operating enter (NOC) of PAWAN will be connected to the State Data Centre (SDC) to provide dedicated access to applications hosted at State and Central Department. Internet access will also be provided to PAWAN users through Internet Gateway at State Network Center. Point to Point and point to multipoint video conferencing through High Quality video equipments & Multimedia PC is also provisioned in the network. The SWAN shall be connected to the Common Service Centers

(CSCs) for providing access to major e-governance services/ applications at the village level.5

Present Status6
One State Network Center is operational with 20 districts connected to it. Further 174 SDNC/BNC are connected to respective districts.

The services at present being served from SNC are:

1. Video Conferencing is available at all districts and also available in special Horizontal offices. 2. 3. IP Telephony is available at all PoPs. Internet is available at PoP and Computer Systems connected to it. 4. Messaging Solution is available at all the PoPs.

State Data Center (SDC)

State Data Centre Scheme for establishing Data Centers across 35 States/ UTs across the country was approved by the Government on 24 th January 2008 with a total expense of Rs 1623.2 crores. It includes the Capital and Operational expenses over a period of five years. The States/ Uts have been categorized in three categories namely Large, Medium and

Small. Through the State Data Centers, the Government wishes to create a common and secure IT infrastructure to host state level e-governance applications or data to enable seamless delivery of Government to Government (G2G) , Government to Citizen (G2C) and Government to Business (G2B) services. State Data Centre acts as a mediator & convergence point between open unsecured public domain and sensitive government environment.

State Data Centre: Objectives7

Create state-of art Data Centre infrastructure coupled with communication and other infrastructure. To provide shared, secure and managed infrastructure for consolidating and hosting State level applications with the view to provide G2G, G2C, G2B services. To provide fast, efficient and secure online services to the citizens. To provide trustworthy and managed environment, where citizents can conduct secure transactions.

The state data centre will serve as central repository of the databases for the State with secure data storage thus providing integrated

and reliable 24 * 7 online delivery of services. Some of the key deparmtnetts/ projects, for which SDC infrastructure and services is an immediate requirement are Excise & Taxation, Land Records, Food and Civil supplies, Local Government, SUWIDHA, MMPs and many other departments. 8The Department of Information Technology (DIT) has approved the Establishment of State Data Centers (SDC) in 27 States/ UTs for a total outlay of Rs 1,237 Crores. The State whose proposals have been approved by DIT are: Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Orissa,

Puducherry, Punjab, Rajashthan, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Bihar, Uttarkhand, Arunachal Pradesh & Mizoram. State Data Center (SDC) will facilitate various State departments to host their Services/ applications on a common infrastructure this has lead the ease of Integration and efficient management, ensuring that computing resources and the support connectivity infrastructure (SWAN) is

adequately and optimally used. These services would be extended to Government agencies, Citizens and Businesses through the connectivity Infrastructure being rolled out such as State Wide Area network (SWAN)

and Common Service Centers (CSC) M/s Wipro Limited is the Project consultant for the implementation of this project. In accordance with national e-governance plan the Punjab government has decided to set a state data centre at Chandigarh and district data centres at each district to cater the information needs at various levels. The Punjab government distict data centres will be established in district administrative complex. The servers will be procured by individual departments and the department of information technology will invest on the data centre hardware as per the Request for Proposal.

Present status
The RFPs which were under preparation of 16 States are Andhra Pradesh, Pujab, Manipur, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Bihar, Uttarakhand, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Andaman & Nicobar, Jammu & Kashmir and Lakhshadweep.9

Source: Round Table Conference, 2009 Common Services Centers (CSCs) The CSC is a strategic cornerstone of the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), approved by the Government in May 2006, as part of its commitment in the National Common Minimum Programme to introduce e-

governance on a massive scale. The PPP model of the CSC scheme envisages a 3-tier structure consisting of the CSC operator (called village Level Entrepreneur or VLE); the Service Centre Agency (SCA), that will be responsible for a division of 500-1000 CSCs; and a State Designated Agency (SDA) identified by the State Government responsible for managing the implementation over the entire State.10 The State Government is determined to merge its e-Government accomplishments with the overall framework of the Central governments proposed CSC Scheme to reach out to the citizens staying in rural Punjab. Under this programme, Punjab plans to set up 2,500 common services centres that would provide high quality and cost-effective video, voice and data content in the areas of e-governance, education, health,

entertainment and other government and private services. The Punjab State Government has appointed Punjab State e-Governance Society (SSEGS) as the State Nodal Agency (SLA) to coordinate the implementation of the CSC Schme. For effective implementation of the scheme identification of e-Government Services to be delivered, factors involved in establishment of CSCs, assessment of Network/ Technology architecture, and present status of PAWAN and procurement of SCAs through study of these was conducted.

Punjab government is planning to implement 2,112 Common Service Centres (CSCs) in rural areas across the state. These service centres will act as service deliver points for government and business services to the citizens at the village leve. The CSCs would offer Punjab citizens a large number of services in the areas of e-Governance, education, health, agriculture, commercial and retail. Delivering government services by these CSCs will be mandatory. The CSCs will be located across 10 zones and all installation and commissioning would be completed in a years time. 11

Common Service Centers

CSCs will help bridge the technological divide between the urban and rural masses. With a view to offer an integrated set of services to the citizens, the Sukhmani Society for Citizen Services was created. Sukhmani Service centres would offer citizen services pertaining to all departments under one-roof. Sukhmani Society is a district level body that would work under the overall umbrella framework of Punjab State E-Governance Society (PSEGS). Punjab State E-Governance Society (PSEGS) has been identified as State Designated Agency (SDA) for facilitating implementation of CSCs scheme in Punjab 12. All the service centers in the district would be established, managed and run by the Sukhmani Society of that district

on a self sustaining revenue model. Policies of the government with regards to Sukhmani can be deployed from a single point across the entire state consequently immensely improving the manageability, integrity and reliability of the system. Sukhmani is more than a mere technology integration project. It would serve as a mix of offline and online means to deliver the citizen services. Sukhmani is a distributed application with one of the aims to establish a very high degree of availability of the application. SUKHMANI stands for Smart, Unified, Knowledgeable, Humble/ Honest, Moral, Accountable, Novel Initiative. Present Status The RFP for selection of Service Centre Agencies is under approval of Government of Idnia.

Sukhmani14, the government of Punjab project helps in government functions such as information dissemination, approvals, transactions, and grievance redressal. Sukhmani is the citizen geteway for over 120 services provided by the government. The solution has three main components. 1. 2. 3. A WAN IT infrastructure for service centres Applications to automate various services which can

communicate asynchronously to a transaction geteway.

The first component includes creating a WAN to connect the planned 120 plus services centres to a central data centre. The second element is to create a cost-effective, scalable IT infrastructure. The third is to create effective shrink wrapped applications that can be quaickly rolled out across the service centres. Microsoft is the solutions partner for the Project. It is not just a technology project but one that encompasses reengineering of business processes to create innovative solutions that offer integrated citizen services under one roof.15

SUWIDHA
SUWIDHA has been conceived to facilitate the citizen by capturing the input at a single point, defining a specified delivery date depending upon the type of service and accepting cash at the counter itself. SUWIDHA was launched Fatehgarh Sahib in Punjab in October 2002 and rolled out to all districts of Punjab by January 2004 on the basis of a self sustaining revenue model. The operational cost of running the centers is recover from citizens in the form of facilitation charges. Single User-

friendly window Disposal Help- line for Applicants (SUWIDHA), the one stop shop for devlivery of more than 150 citizen services offered by the

central , state and local governments was ranked Topmost among all the e-governance projects in the country by Skoch in 2005-06. also SUWIDHA received Excellence award from Microsoft in September 2006. SUWIDHA
16

is built to provide the convenience to the citizen by

capturing the input at a single point, defining a specified delivery data depending upon the type of service, accepting cash at the counter itself and delivering district administration services to the citizens from the same counters. It ensures timely delivery without any need to interact with the concerned branch, SUWIDHA has been implemented in all the districts of Punjab. Online status of the applications submitted on SUWIDHA Counters in the districts is available on SUWIDHA website (http://suwidha.nic.in). After the successful pilot launch of SUWIDHA-SDM at SDM Mohali, SUWIDHA Project has been replicated at 56 SDM offices of Punajb and is being expanded to all SDM offices. Earlier the services provided by manual system now provided by eSUWIDHA were expensive and time consuming; middleman harassed common people and tried to shell money. Moreover no fixed time frame for the services was there. The objective of SUWIDHA about taking IT to rural areas is to facilitate citizens by capturing inputs at a single point, defining a specified delivery data depending upon the type of service, accepting cash at the

counter itself and delivery of final document. This project has been able to give fast, convenient and corruption-free delivery of services to citizens. It has been implemented successfully in all the districts and most of the SubDivisional offices of Punjab. SUWIDHA provides more than 33 services to citizens which includes services such as registration of marriages, arms license, ration card, issuance of passport, driving license, registration of vehicle, collection of application for old age pension, SC/BC/OBC certificates and birth & death Certificate.17 The objectives of SUWIDA is to provide responsive and transparent services to the citizens of the state by means of friendly and affordable interface between the government and public the objective is to offer citizens cost effective service at the same time improving the quality of service. On the technology side implementing technology in such a way to promote transparency, efficiency, objectivity, accountability and speed in government processes.

Main Features18:

All submissions of applications/requests for service(s) on a single counter. Linkage with backend applications. The citizen is not required to visit the branch as the status can also be made available either through

WebCITI (Web-based Citizen IT Interface) or DialITI (Dialup-based Citizen IT Interface). Committed date for the delivery of service. Automatic stamping of the delivery data on computer- generated receipt, based on the type of service requested. Monitoring by SDM for delays beyond the specified dates Delivery of the services from the same counter. No need to visit the branch. On the spot capturing of photo whenever required; saves time and cost to the citizen. Acceptance of petty cash. Now citizen will not be required to visit the bank and the Treasury for paying service charges. Information on schemes and procedures. Application forms. Provision for on the spot delivery of services where the verification can be ensured based on the data available in district databases.

Benefits of SUSIDHA to citizens

All the applications pertaining to different jobs of DC office are accepted at Single Window, Delivery time for each and every job is pre-

defined, Delivery is made through SUWIDHA counter, and a Citizen can check the status of application through web site http://suwidha.nic.in

e-Suwidha brings in a number of benefits, such as:

Hassle-free process for the applicant the applicant goes to the nearest CIC to submit his or her application and can check the status of the application on the web. The applicant need not visit the actual office to submit his or her application or to know the status. Transparency in dealing- the applicant goes to the acceptance centre and does not have to deal with the officals who actually process it. Greater monitoring and control over the office performance of staffdetails of tendency at each state is maintained and is available online for monitoring by the head of office. HCLI was awarded the contract to establish the Punjab State Wide Area Network (PAWAN). Horizontal connectivity has been established across all districts and state head offices. The project has enabled the state to connect government bodies in 179 blocks across twenty districts. Most of the applications running on PAWAN have been developed. One center has been set up to handle pilot project. Twenty CSC scalled Suwidha Centers in Punjab have come up in the district level across the

state while seventy more have come up at the sub-district level. Twentyfour services are being offered from the Suwidha Centers at the district level, while twelve services are offered from the sub-district Suwidha Centers. The numbers of services as well as centers are likely to be increased soon under the PPP model, which is being rolled out now. There are plans to roll out CSCs in urban areas too. E-KiosKs a touch screen based system, the software of E-Kiosk has been developed to provide the status of SUWIDHA applications, Voter list, information about various schemes, Bus/ Rail Time table etc. The project is maintained by team of operators and supervisor employed by District Administration for Suwidha Project. The Suwidha Centre is completely owned by the respective District Administrations. The project provides various services like: Issuance/ renewal of bus passes, issuance of id cards, issuance of various certificates, driving licenses, arms licenses and other, NOC for various services, etc. Suwidha Project will be integrated with CSC scheme of Government of India. Application processing in government is mainly paper based and not very citizen friendly. Generally, in the existing administrative setup, when an applicant submits his or her application along with supporting documents, the application goes through a number of steps of verification

and validation. The citizen has to visit various desks several times bedore the document is finally available to him or her. With the implementation of SUWIDHA, citizens can submit their request for services at a single location and monitor their status. The administrators can monitor the efficiency of his or her subordinates in delivering these services; and consequently will be in a position to initiate correcting steps in improving the efficiency. This brings in transparency to the process of providing services at the local level and reduces harassment of the citizens. In a nutshell, SUWIDHA uses information technology to simplify the processes of government functioning to bring efficiency and transparency in governance.

e-District
With the consolidation of state data base at SDC, successful implementation of PAWAN, and CSC, e-District project is also turning into reality. Integrated and seamless delivery of citizen services through Common Service Centres in a systematic way by district administration with the automation of workflow, backend computerization, data digitization across participating departments is the ultimate aim of the e-district project.

The Governemnt has initiated the required steps to implement eDistrict project under National e-governance Plan (NeGP), which would pave the way for integration of all the services of different departments at district level and complete workflow based backend digitization. Pilot District are Nawanshahr19 and Kapurthala20. According to the e-District guidelines, the implementation of eDistrict project (Phase-I) is planned over a period of eighteen months for study, development, testing and roll-out in the two pilot districts. Thereafter Request for Proposal (RFP) would be prepared for state wide roll out for the rest of the districts in the stat ein the next six montsh21.

Major IT application of Punjab is through following projects: Web-based counseling for PSBTE (Punjab State

Technical Education Board)

Web-based Counseling for PSBTE (Punjab State Technical Education Board ) First of its kind in the state of Punjab, We based off Campus Counseling for PSBTE has been implemented for the admissions in all the Diploma courses in Engineering, Lateral Entry (LEET) to Engineering and Pharamacy streams in 70 institutes across the state, a

most transparent system of admitting students to various academic steams. Three rounds of counseling were held for 16,638 seats available in polytechnic colleges in the state of Punjab spanning over one month. In total, 21000 studetns registered themselves for taking admissions in all the three streams. The Punjab State Board of Technical Education22 (PSBTE) is an autonomous statutory authority crated under the Punjab State Board of Technical Education & Industrial Trainign act 1992, for regulating and controlling academic standards in Institutes of Technical Education and for making admission & conducting examinations in Polytechnics and Industrial Training Institutes. The board conducts Joint Entrance Test (JET) for admission to various engineering diploma courses being run in the Government, Govt. Aided/ Self-financing Institutions affiliated to the board. For other course such as Pharmacy and Lateral entry to diploma courses, the marks based merit list is considered.23

Objectives
Web based counseling for admission to all courses, is being conducted with main objectives to bring in 100% transparency in seats allotment and admission. Government of Punjab initiative to build a public interface to minimize travel burdens on candidates and their parents for

counseling. Entralized database and centralized monitoring provides ample time to counselees for submission, change, delete, re-ordering of multiple choices from anywhere any time with paperless counseling. The advantage of on-line off campus counseling is that the seat vacated by earlier candidate will be right away allotted to the next candidate in the merit, who has opted of it. In physical counseling it is allotted in the subsequent allotments, the merit candidate will be denied of his choice and the seat will be allotted to a candidate, who is lower in themerit. Web-based online off-Campus Counseling for Punjab State Technical Education Board (PSBTE) has been successfully conducted this year for the admissions in all the Diploma courses in Engineering, Lateral Entry to Engineering and Pharmacy steams in all the 70 institutes across the state. Previously, all the students were required to come to PSBTE Chandiarh for the counseling spread over many days, which was a hectic exercise for both candidates as well as authorites. But web based counseling allowing the candidates from anywhere to enter unlimited choices was a pleasant experiences in the Chandigarh (UT) as well as ccentral institutes at Ludhiana and Jalandhar which are governed under reservation policies of UT administration and central government respectively. In order to provide ample opportunity to the deserving

candidates of different stratum, three rounds of counseling spanning around one month in July-August, were conducted.24

PRISM (Property Registration Information System Module)

PRISM is ISO certified product which automates all major activates of Sub-Registrar office and over deeds of Sale, Mortgage, Will, Adoption, SPA, GPA, Exchange, Pattanama/ Lease, Tatima, Cancellation of SPA/GPA/Will etc. Skoch ranked PRISM ninth among all the e-governance projects in the country in 2005-06. PRISM means complete land registration including valuation of property based on market value, capturing photographs of sellers, buyers and witness. Scanning of deed document, printing of endorsement based on their deeds with captured photographs, Entry module for property attribute such as Khewat, Khasra and Khatoni with increased security feature have been introduced. Major features include token issuance, online capturing, storage, printing of photographs on stamp paper, valuation of property, scanning of deed documents online/offline, on the spot registration, issuance of mutation notice as Parchayadast, finalization & pendency check of deeds by SRO, single window service etc. It has been implemented in all 153 SRO offices in Punjab.

i-TISP (Integrated Tresuries Information System of Punjab)

i-TISP is an online system developed by National Informatics

Center for automation of district treasuries in Punjab. Directorate of Treasuries and Accounts, is the mechanism through which effective

financial control is exercise over public spending by Government. Salient features of TISP are verification of messenger and DDO by photograph and signature, online system, computerized cheque printing, linkage with budget, AG account & bank, tight security, Web enabled etc. Payments, receipts pension, LOC stamp etc are included. It has been implemented at all the District Treasuries and all Sub-Treasuries of the state. All subtreasuries and treasuries have been linked to the state HQ.25

Source: Department of IT, GoP The above figure explains the overall architecture of Integrated Treasuries Information system of Punjab (i-TISP). I-TISP uses Microsoft platform and technology and is a client/ server architecture. The home page for i-TISP is http://www.khazana.nic.in The computer greatly reduce the time used in calculation and enhance the accuracy and reliability of financial reports. Due to chronic delays in compiling the accounts at the District Treasuries, the final details of Accounts are difficult to generate, which will also be possible to be

generated with speed and accuracy. In turn it will aid the Government in analyzing the fiscal transactions minutely. After computerization generation generation of day-to-day reports on receipts and payments are possible. Reports are generated indicating variations of actual and budgeted receipts and payments. The monthly Major Head wise and Department wise reports shall be gernated through the application software, which shall be used by Finance Department.26 All the 21 District Treasuries including Punjab Treasury Chandgigarh and 68 sub Treasuries have been computerized with following modules payment Module, Receipt Module , Pension Module, LOC Module, Stamps Module, Data Creation & Transmission Module.

VAHAN (Vehicle Registration System) and SARATHI (Driving License Issuance System for Transport Department)
Computerization of Regional Transport offices (RTO) and district Transport offices (DTO) had been initiated by a number of State Governments like Delhi, Maharashtra, Bihar, Goa, West Bengal and others. Department of Transport, Government of Punjab is one of tehm. It has modules for Registration of Commercial and Private Vehicle, Fee & Fine Collection, Fitness Validity and tax. Replication in the districts is under process. SARTHI (Driving License Issuance System for Transport

department ) includes various transactions like Learners License, Permanent License, Conductors License and Driving School License. Manual system reported suffered form duplication of effort, wastage of time and could not produce list of defaulters efficiently. VAHAN will provide connectivity with transport offices not only across state but across the nation. Such connectivity will prove its worth in tacking vehicles involved in illegal activities. Stolen vehicles can be traced and duplicate registration will not be possible of the same vehicle. It providesuseful data for better monitoring of the itner-state and National Permits, avoiding issuance of driving license to unauthorized persons and monitoring the inter-state issues in a better way. The benefit of implementation of this project is to be able to deliver driving licenses and vehicle registration certificates in 45 minutes which earlier use to take 10-15 days. In the state of Punjab this project has already made its mark with successful implementation in the districts of Roopnagar and Mohali. Project VAHAN and SARATHI will be rolled out across the state on the BOOT basis.

MESS (Monitoring of Elections Systems through SMSs)

MESS27 is Web based application software for Department of Electios, Punjab. The application is aimed at capturing a set of fixed events

for all the Polling Stations of an Assembly Constituencies through SMS by the authorized mobile numbers from respective Polling stations (in this case PROs) in a prescribed format and to update the database for onoine monitoring reports on CEOs website. The software has the provision for entering data through web-entry also 28 which is allowed to authorize users like ROs/AROs of the assembly segments only.

AIS (Affidavit Issuance System) AIS29 provides easy access to the

administration for attestation of affidavit of any kind by paying nominal fees. The photograph of the deponent is captured in person on the sport along with purpose of affidavit and other relevant details. Welcomed and accepted by the citizens, media and administrators, AIS has been replicated at more than 50 Tehsils in addition to all the 20 districts with service over multiple counters. CIPA30, one of the mission mode projects under National eGovernance Plan, is an attempt to build infrastructure and a mechanism to provide the basis for evolution of a nationwide crime and criminals information system from the police station level based on the Criminal Procedure code (CrPC). Common Integrated Police Application (CIPA) Project is a Mission Mode Project (MMP) under e-Governance of Government of Idnia. Common Integrated Police Application (CIPA) aims

at automation of all functions carried out at the police stations. Initially only Crime Module has been taken up. CIPA software has been designed and developed by NIC in English language with multilingual interface developed for Indian languages 31. The task of monitoring the implementation of CIPA project has been entrusted to NCRB and State Implementation Branch is monitoring the progress of CIPA implementation. 32 A project of Ministry of Home Affairs to computerize and networking of all the police station, it aims at reduction of manual records, elimination of duplicate and inconsistent record keeping, maintenance of details of criminals, introducing transparency in the working of police facilitating supervision by the senior officer and faster response to the public. It records the events of development made by the investigating officers in the case during investigation and facilitates entering the contents in the case diary. It records all development s in the case right up to the prosecution stage, like hearing of the case, and summons/ warrants issued by the court. The implementation in Punjab has been initiated.

DSS (Depot Sahayak System )

The first Computerized Depot of Pepsu Road Transport corporation (PRTC) was established at Patiala in Punjab33. The software for the Depot, named as Depot Sahayak System has been developed by NIC

Punjab. At present the software supports commercial activites of the deport like generation of waybills, ticket stock, different rotations, advance booking waybills, duty roaster etc. it also helps the corporation in generating the various reports on Route Receipt, Mileage of Buses, total cash collection, passenger taxes for Punjab and other states, over time calculation for crew etc. System designed for Pepsu Roadways ransport Corporation (PRTC) 34, DSS covers operations like Generation of Waybills, Closing of Waybills, Ticket Stock Arriaval and Issuance, Ticket Box management, Generation of Advance booking Waybills Closing of Advance Booking Waybills, Tax Calculations and Overtime Calculations etc.

AGMARKNET (Agriculture Produce Marketing Information Network)

Whether it is domestic or overseas trade, the agricultural produce sector has been most important component of State economy. A marketing system backed by strong, adequate infrastructure is the core of agricultural marketing. An efficient agricultural marketing is essential for the development of the agricultural sector. AGMRKNET35 is a central sector scheme that was launched by the Department of Agriculture and

Cooperation in March 2000. The scheme aims at progressively linking important agricultural produce markets spread all over Idnia and the State Agriculture Marketing Boards/ Directorates and the DMI for effective exchange of market information. The market information network, AGMARKNET (agmarknet.ni.in), is being implemented jointly by DMI and NIC, using NICNET facilities available throughout the country.

AGMARKNET facilitates market fees collection, database of dealers, Issuance of Licenses for dealers etc. Weekly prices and arrivals trends are also being disseminated using the portal. Monthly prices and arrivals bulletins are being generated using the national database. The state Agricultural Marketing Board/Departments/Markets are collecting the desired market information and passing them to the authorites and Head office of DMI for forward dissemination. Directorate of Marketing and Inspection (DMI) has association with the State Agricultural Marketing Boards and Directorates for Agricultural marketing Development in the country. The Objectives36 of AGMARKNET is to establish a nation wide information network for rapid collection and dissemination of market information for its proficient utilization. Computerization of data on market fee, arket charges, total arrivals, arrivals by agencies, prices, storage, dispatches with destination, mode of transportation, costs, sold and unsold

stocks, sources of supply with destination, method of sale, payment, weighting, grading facilities, quantities, graded, market personnel, market functionaries, market finance, development programmes, infrastructure facilities, constitution/ composition of Market committee, income and expenditure and other activites of the APMCs (Agricultural Produce Market Committee), State Marketing Boards and Directorates etc. will ensure flow of regular and reliable data to producers, traders and consumers to derive maximum benefit of their sales and purchases. AGMARKNET has increased the efficiency in marketing by effecting improvement in the existing market information system. It has reached to the unreached (farmers) thus providing them timely and reliable information for decision making and reaping the future benefits. For easy interface with farmers and other beneficiaries a portal for AGMARKENT (http://agmarknet.ni.in) has been developed to serve as a single window for accessing websites of various organizations concerned with agricultural marketing. AGMARKNET has led to a nation-wide information network for speedy collection and diffusion of marked information, computerization of market related information such as market fees, market charges, etc., ensuring regularity and reliability of data and increasing the efficiency in agricultural markets.

Social Security Information System SSIS37 enables to

maintain and monitor the data base of pension beneficiaries under different social security schemes disbursed through DDSSOs of Department of Social Security and Women & Child Development. After successful implementation of pilot basis at district Fatehgarh Sahib replication is being taken up in other districts.

DACNET (Department of Agriculture and Cooperation Network)

DACNET38 follow a very transparent approach in providing a comprehensive resource of agriculture related information through a website open to all. Its objective is to computerize all fields and Directorate Offices covered under Agriculture and Cooperation. For analysis and reporting of pesticides in RPTL office, a work flow application named SARS Sample Analysis and Reporting System has been developed for Regional Pesticide Testing Lab, Chandigarh. It aims at integrating Government functions (G2G), integrating agri-business partners (B2B), connecting farmers (C2C) and empowering employees (A2E). This peoject also covers operations like development of Portal for Directorate RPTL, implementation of generic application and provides support in

computerization of the Directorate like dialup networking etc. all the data from the field is updated on its website (http://dacnet.nic.in) on weekly

basis. The impact of the project has been so that the Customer Satisfaction Index is a soaring high of 91.5%.39

DCIS (District Courts Information System)

Envisaging the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), government of Punjab aims to transform the live of citizen in the long run and bring about changes to existing government organizations, by making governmentcentric services available easily to citizens. One such step by the government of Punjab is the introduction of the e-Judiciary system by setting up e-Courts 40 in the state. As part of the Mission Mode Project (MMP) under the NeGP, an attempt has been made to computerize the judicial processes. According to the plan, ICT tools will be implemented in all the courts across the state. The stakeholders in the e-Courts comprise of the citizens, lawmakers, judges, police officials, etc.

Objective
The main objective of this project is to help the judicial administration of the courts in streamling their day-to-day operations. Also to help in

reducing the cases those are pending. The focus is to fundamentally offer transparency of information to the litigants and regular access to legal judicial databases to the judges. As per NeGP e-courts mission mode project aims ICT enablement of the lower courts across the country. Local Area Network has been established in Patiala District Court on pilog basis. Replication in other 16 Districts Courts has been planned. The project, which will finally be implemented in all district of Punjab, is being funded by the Punjab and Haryana High Court. The software for these ecourts is being developed by the National Informatics Centre. The e-courts one functional would also help litigants know the latest status of their cases.

CONFONET (Consumer Forums Network) is an initiative of centre

government to computerize and connect the state consumer disputes redressed commissions and District consumer forums to form a network.

OAS (Office Automation Suite)

OAS comprises of four generic and customizable modules to automate the internal processes of any government office. DDMS (Dairy

and Dispatch Monitoring System) is developed to manage and

monitor the receipt and dispatch of mail and its movement. CCMS (Court

Cases Monitoring System) is designed to facilitate departments in

maintaining and monitoring court cases pending in different courts CoIS

(Courts Information System) is generic customizable solution to

manage administration of the court related activities of the officers holding the courts. Specially customized version for Labour court Patiala has been under implementation to be replicated among all the labour courts. MMS

(Meeting Monitoring system) provides single point solution for

organizing various meetings in the department by assisting in generation of agenda of agenda itmes, Memos for the meetings, recording of minutes, action status, etc.

PAPMIS (Punjab Agricultural Produce Management Information System)

Computerization41 of market Committees, DMO and Mandi Board Head Office, It covers all the operation of market committees like registration of dealers, calculation of Market Fee, Recording of daily arrival, monitoring of sale & purchase etc. this software helps the market committee to transmit the data to AGMARKNET portal. Up to data

information of MCs is also being transmitted to DMO and Mandi Board Head Office with the help of this software.

BPIS (Bus Passes Issuance System) is developed to facilitate

the issuance of Bus Passes to the eligible applicants. Implemented at Patiala district, BPIS will be taken up in all the districts.

Immigration

Check

post

Computerization

has

been

implemented at Amritsar check post.

VC (Video conferencing) has been established in the 17 District

and Punjab Civil Secretariat and being used by various departments of Punjab Government.

DISE (District Information System for Election) DISE is

randomization software for Election Department which handles the functionalities like formation of polling parties for Lok Sabha/ Assembly Elections in a random way, etc. as per Election Commission of India (ECI) guidelines.

DISDIS (District Sangat Darshan Information System)

computerized system to automate and monitor the process of grievances monitoring with host of features. DISDIS (District Sangat Darshan Information System) has been implemented in all the districts 42.

DSMS (District Scheme Monitoring System) to evaluate the

progress of large number of development work/scheme on monthly basis for the better monitoring by the distict authorities, DSMS has been developed. It has the provision for storage of photographs of every stage of a work and the all relevant data. After successful implementation on pilot basis at Fatehgarh Sahib District, DSMS is being replicated in other districts.

NREGA (National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005)

A special compaign has been launched in Punjab for successful implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) and to make the implementing agencies more accountable by monitoring of work allocation and funds under NREGA. Rural development and panchyats minister Ranjit Singh Brahmpura said 5.24 lakh job cards have already been issued to the families in rural areas under NREGA in the state. The Central government had made a provisional allotment of Rs 172 crore to Punjab for the current financial year, of which the first installment of Rs 85.2 crore has been recived so far. 60% of the amount would be spent on the wages of the workers and the remaining 40% on material.43 This web based system, (http://www.nrega.nic.in) facilitates for online data entry, and issuing job cards etc. In first phase, it was

implemented

in

four

district

Hosiarpur,

Jalandhar,

Amritsar

and

Nawanshahar. From this financial year, it has been replicated in all the remaining 16 district also which are now covered under the project.

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan (SSA)

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is an effort to universalize elementary education by community-ownership of the school system. It is a response to the demand for quality basic education all over the country. The SSA program is also an attempt to provide an opportunity for improving human capabilities to all children, through provision of community owned quality education in a mission mode. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) launched in 2001 is initiative of the Government of India, which presents it sguidelines, planning methodology, data on elementary education created under District Information System for Education (DISE)_ list of district covered, addresses of state implementation societies and outcome of the research studies conducted on school attendance, teachers absenteeism, out-ofschool children, mid-day meal and many other aspects of elementary education in India. SSAMIS is a web based solution

(http://www.ssamis.nic.in) for monitoring progress of three education scheme namely (SSA-Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, KGBV- Gasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya, NPEGEL- National Programme for girls education at

elementary level) being run at block/ gram panchayat level. The implementation of SSAMIS has been initiated in Punjab State and annual target data and quarterly achievement data entry has been started since its launch on 31st July 2008. Punjab School Education Board (PSEB), chairman, D.S. Dhillon said 44 We are going to launch digital textbooks from the next session. The books will be made available online and students can have access to them anytime, anywhere. This services will be available free of any charges.

Pre Conception and Pre Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PC & PNDT)- PNDT45 is a web based system designed with major objective to
monitor and improve the sex ratio between Boy and girls child by keeping track of every pregnant women going for clinical follow- up to Hospital, Clinics, Laboratory for the regular checkup. All the details about the women can be entered in FORM F as in prescribed format and can be entered online in the PNDT software. District administrative user can create separate users for clinics, Laboratory and hospitals. The district administration can generate MIS and can monitor on regular interval & submit to the state 46. At the central level, national level MIS on PC & PNDT of all states will be created.

National Panchayat Portal (NPP) and ePRI

NPP contains the dynamic portals for all ZPs(540), BPs (6096) and GPs(2,35,000). National Panchayat Portal (NPP, http://Panchayat.nic.in) as Fron end solution for all PRIs were prepared by NIC and launched during the VII Round Table Conference atJaipur.NIC is responsible to steer the project as main & primary software solution provider. Aiming at strengthening three-tier Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) in the state, the functioning of Gram Panchayats in Punjab will be strengthened through computertization under ePRI scheme of National e-Gram Panchayats. The ambitious scheme to connect all Gram Panchayats (GPs) with national eGovernance would be launched in all the district and 90% cost would be borne by the Center and balance by the state. The Punjab Government is committed to adopting ePRI scheme on priority basis with a view to putting this plan into practice. The proposed scheme would bring about improved governance and service delivery through GPs and enable greater accountability of PRIs to the community and other authorities.47 Rural Development and Panchayat Minister Rajit Singh

Brahmpura48 said the scheme to connect all panchayats would be launched soon. He said the ePRI scheme would be adopted on priority and project report and been submitted for the national panchayat portal. He

added that the 73rd amendment to the Constitution had provided for funds for PRIs. Now e-PRI, a centrally sponsored scheme for e-Governance in PRIs, would be introduced, he said. The scheme would improve governance and service delivery through panchayats, ensure

accountability of the PRIs to the community and authorities, the minister said.49

PVSIS (Punjab Vidhan Sabha Information System) PVSIS

Covers personal details of MLAs with related information about the working of Sessions that is: About the list of business, Questions asked in the session, Bills and resolutions passed in the Vidhan Sabha, Calling attention notice of Vidhan Sabha, Information about the previous Vidhan Sabha (Information regarding sessions held, sittings of the sessions etc), Other support services related to Pensioners, Status of MLAs Bill (regarding salary allowance, TA/DA bills, reimbursement of telephone & medical bills etc),

 General information about Council of Ministers, Prime Minister, Chief Minister, Governors, Spearkers, Depury Speakers, MPs and former MPs from Punjab. Database of officers of Punjab Vidhan Sabha, Current News and Information about meetings of the Committees, etc. Some other initiatives taken by government of Punjab are:

CIS

(Certificate

Issuance A bilingual application for issuance

of various certificates Area, likece Caste

System)

covering

Backward

Certificate, Income Certificate, Rural Area Certificate, Neem Kandi Pahari Area Area

Certificate,

Certificate, Other Backward Class Certificate, Residence Certificate, Schedule Caste Certificate, SubMountain Area Certificate implemented solution etc. at for

Successfully

PBIS

(Budget

Sangruru district. Preparation Offers automated

and Information System)

Budget preparation for Government

EEMS Exchange System)

of Punjab (Employment Performs all the operations of an

Management employment

exchange

including

registration, renewal of registration, vacancy booking and submission

HCIS (Handicap Issuance System)

etc. Certificate Facilitates

the

issucance

of

handicap certificate issued by Civil Surgeon office. Successfully

National Sccial

implemented at Sangrur district. Assistance Provides assistance on three national schemes Indira Gandhi

Programme (NSAP)

National Old Ages Pension Scheme (IGNOAPS), Indira Gandhi National Widows Pension Scheme

(IGNWPS), Indira Gandhi National Diasbled Pension Scheme

(IGNDPS) Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak To effectively monitor the entire

Yojna (PMGSY)

programme

and

bring

about

improved efficiency, accountability and transparency in implementation, web enabled application software

(www.pmgsy.nic.in)

Online

Managemet and Monitoring System

e-Courts Project Arms

Mission

(OMMS) Mode To establish LAN connectivity in all the district courts under mission

Licenses

mode project (MMP) Issuance Provides workflow of Arms Licenses branch with tracking mechanism apart from License generation and

System (ALIS)

Birth

&

Death

history maintenance. Issuance System developed to maintain Birth and Death registrations and of

System (BDIS) MAREG Registration System)

issuance of certificates. the process (Marriage Automates

Information registration 50 of marriages at

district/SDM successfully level. Pilot project at

implemented

Jalandhar district. MAis taken up for reapplication across the state.

MARRCIS (Marriage ability Issuance Certificate Issuance System)

certificate

of and

marriageautomates

ability the

process including noting generation,

newspaper notice etc ICIS (Identity Card Issuance Facilitates the issucance of Identity

System)

Card to district officials as well as for for at

the Nambardar of villages. ADIS (Atta Dal Information To facilitate Government

System)

distribution

of

food

grain

subsidized rates to poor families of

OPA

(Office

Punjab. Automation For automating the file movement and monitoring in an office.

Procedure)

Successfully implemented in the Department of Fianance in Punjab Civil Secretariat and department of

DCIS

(District

Planning. Courts Local Area

Network

has

been

Information System)

established in Patiala District Court on pilot basis. Replication in other Districts courts has been planned.

E-Kiosks- A touch screen based system, has been developed to

provide the status of SUWIDHA applications, Voter list, information about various schemes, Bus/Rail Time table etc.

E-Kiosk has been implemented at Nawanshehar, Muktsar and Fatehgarh Sahib. Web Services initiatives of Government of Punjab are Websites of all the Districts of Punjab, Official Web Site of Govt. of Punjab, Punjab Vidhan Sabha, Official e-mail server for Govt. of Punjab

(http://punjabmail.gov.in), Dynamic web site of Regional Passport Offices in Punjab, SUWIDHA on Web (http://suwidha.nic.in), Intranet for Secretariat LAN, WebQMS (Web Based Quality Management System): Web based Quality Managemetn System for NIC, NIC Punjab Website (http://pbsc.ni.in), Domain Name Registration, Security Auditing, Website Hosting , VPN Services (Remote Publishing facilities) Geographical Information System, Digitization of village level maps for all he seventeen districts, and linkage of digitized maps with village directory database. The Chandigarh administration has taken a number of initiaties to create the necessary infrastructure required for the promotion of the IT industry. Establishing a Optic Fibre Cable (OFC) Backbone Network which now covers the whole of Chandigarh is serving the main requirement of connectivity. Chandigarh is already among the first cities in the country to have optic fibre connectivity with Delhi, through the network of Power Grid India Limited.

Chandigarh Administration has established a numbder of centres provding citizen-centric services. All the major departments and centres for citizen centric services, eSampark, eJanSampark and eGramSampark are connected. There are 7 Point of Presence established across the city providing high-bandwidth connectivity to Network & Data Centre. These PoPs are further connected to departments/offices to facilitate application and information exchange. North of New Delhi, Chandigarh UT Unit is functioning as Regional Network Centre providing connectivity to the states and districts of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir and Chandigarh. Smart Card based Ratio Cards for Public Distribution System (SCbRCPDS) Chandigarh has been selected as Pilot for SCbRCPDS by the Ministry of consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution which has approved the DPR submitted by Chandigarh Administration. District Courts have been computerized covering all the 19 courts. The e-Readiness index of an Indian state/U.T. reflects its capacity to participate in the global networked economy. Chandigarhs performance has been considered outstanding in the Environment Sub-Index, which measures the degree of conduciveness of the environment that a state/U.T provides for the deployment and use of ICT. The Environmetn Sub-Index

has been computed based on three indicators namely market environment, political and regulatory environment and infrastructure environment. Similarly, the Chandigarh has been ranked as a leader in the usage SubIndex that measures the degree of utilization of ICT by individuals businesses and the Government.51

The application of IT for providing information and facilitation to the residents of Chandigarh is through:
e-Sampark e-Jan Sampark m-Sampark e-Gram Sampark

e-Sampark
Project e-sampark was initiated to bring together the services of all the departments under a single umbrella and give the citizens of Chandigarh a multi-service, single-window experience and to create a knowledge-based society through extensive use of I.T. Apart from eradicating the undue harassment met by the citizens due to lack of

transparency it provides effective interaction between the Administration and the public so that exhange of information and access to government departments is speedy and easy, leading to a better quality of life.

The objectives of this projects are 52:

Provide hassle free one-stop solution to the citizen Minimize multiple interaction points for the citizen and hence reducing the wastage of their valuable time. Provide better turn around time in receipt, processing and issue of services. Transparency in delivery of services.

E-Governance is the most significant aspect of the I.T. Policy of Chandigarh Administration. Project e-Sampark is a multi-service single window system, which connects various public dealing departments. The project has been awarded the Golden Icon Award for egovernance by the Government of India. In these centers, 20 services are offered like payment of taxes, utility bills, passport application,

disbursement of old-age pension and other utility services. The department of information technology, Chandigarh

Administration, has been playing a key role by offering varied public utility

services at one place e-Sampark centers, but the entry will be made for each and every bill/invoice.53 In the last three years of establishment of these centers, the administration has transacted more than Rs 700 crore. In 2006, we earned revenues of Rs 350 crore, which is expected to increase every year. We are transaction more than Rs 1.25 lakh per month from these centers 54. In 2004 under the Information Technology enabled Services (ITeS) the eSampark centres launched have already become a hit, city has 12 of them, including three in rural area. They have done business worth Rs 1,874 crores in just five years (till March 2009) after their launch. The Union Ministry of Communication and IT E-Readiness Assessment Report has ranked Chandigarh as leader in the country in this field. Chandigarh has also won the Golden Icon Award for its e-Sampark Project. The project can be replicated elsewhere because of the robust nature of technology and the wide array of services it can provide. At present, 23G2C and 5B2C services are being provided at 10 e-sampark centres spread all over the city35.

Benefits Accrued 56

 One-stop solution to citizen for multiple tasks, resulting in eradication of frustration to the common man while dealing with many functionaries. Reduction of wastage of time of a citizen as multiple tasks are being performed at these centres. Citizen-Centric centres having state of the art facilities, apart from central location. 8 a.m to 8 p.m service on all days except Sundays Transparency in delivery of services Easy maintenance of MIS leading to quaick reconciliation of treasury collections. The project is so designed that any citizen centric service of any criticality can be provided through it. The criteria for making new services available through the e-Sampark ceters is absed on the requirement generated by citizens, which is available through the feedback received and the citizen satisfaction surveys conducted. Departmental initiative is also taken into account and then an interface for the department is provided to initiate the services. It is given due publicity by way of audio coverage, pamphlets and

notices. The departments are also given access to the central data base for monitoring the progress and generate various MIS reports.

Following are some indicators telling why the project can be called a best practice. Transparency

At E-sampark centers all services are provided through the counters at centres, where officers in the centres deal with the transactions directly in front of other users. There is no separate dealing for any class of users or preferential treatment by any officer of a centre. Services are provided on first come first serve basis. The way of service delivery is a great factor ensuring transparency in the project activities. As opposed to the earlier system of getting these public services which was cumbersome, through e-Sampark centres citizens can now get direct access to various services at single window. Most of the users avoided the process and got there services done by middle men and touts. This has automatically removed the middlemen and touts from the scene and has improved the transparency in the process of services delivery system.

Participation
It is an interdepartmental project implemented with direct

participation and collaboration of various government and non-government organization. The location , setup and infrastructures of the centers have been developed with PPP-public private partnership (present partners are UTI Bank and SQL STAR International Limited). The information provider in the centres are not government employees. They are appointed contractually by the partner organizations of the project. The eSampark centres is based on the requirement generatd by citizens through the feedback received and the citizen satisfaction surveys conducted. The private public institutional participation has improved the quality and availability of services appreciably, the peoples participation has made the services truly preferred services by citizens.

Accountability
In e-Sampak centres, every transaction is direct, users can question the service providers in the centre. Time taken to complete task is specified. The staffs of the centres are appointed contractually for a specific period and are reugularly monitored by a supervisor at each centre and the project coordinator. The staff is accountable of each of his/her activity to the user as well as authority. Apart from regular official

monitoring various surveys are conducted by the authority for the performance check. Continuous monitoring of type of problems citizen face in the existing system and how it can be improved, what more services can be incorporated etc. the results of these surveys are taken into account also. All such activites promote accountability.

Speed and Ease to Service Delivery

In the earlier system, for delivery of services there was no timeframe. Citizens or customers had to wait unknown period of time and run from department to department for a service. The e-Sampark centres provide various services under one roof while ensuring that users get efficient and timely service. The time bound service delivery from the eSampark centres has resulted in improving the efficiency of delivery of the services. The centres also provide necessary information regarding all the services to the users, earlier common citizens even did not know how to get or where to get all those services. Moreover 12 hours service from 8 am to 8 pm every day except Sunday is a great opportunity for the office going or busy personas who can get their services after office time in the evening. The rise in number of transaction at these to 1.46 lakh per month is the fact to prove its utility.

Social Wellbeing
With direct interaction of service provider with the user, the web of middlemen and tout has completely vanished. The project has eliminated bribery and corruption from the process. It has helped in integration of databases of Government departments and organization. The integration and standardization in delivery of services and providing services to all strata of society at same speed ease and efficiency has made a mark in the process of social wellbeing.

Sustainability
Since its launch in September 2004, Rs. 929 Crores of Government revenue has been collected in 40 Lakh transactions. Rs. 310 Crores of revenue has been collected in 9 months (April 07 to December 07) of 2007-08 as compared to Rs. 272 Crores for the same period in 2006-07 (B2C) have also been launched to make the project self sustainable. Phone bills of HFCL-Connect, Airtel and Spice are collected and more similar services are under process of initiation. The project has been proved to be self sustainable. Number of service receivers is increasing day by day.

Reliability
Since last five years the project has been successfully running providing basic citizen services to the citizens of Chandigarh. The project has been proved to be financially and technologically sustainable. So it can also be replicated in other states or cities also. Sustainability of e-Sampark shows that use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can facilitate better public service delivery with in the existing infrastructure and limited human resources. The PPP model as well as collaboration and partificpation of various departments has been the key factor in implementing the Sampark centers. The success factor on the citizen side is surely the transparency, accountability and efficiency.

M-Sampark
Chandigarh Administration uses mobile ICT to enable the citizens to access information e-Sampark services from their mobile phones by sending an SMS SMENU to 58888. A menu to services available is sent back via an SMS, using which he/she can get the required information. The initiative of m-Sampark service was taken to ensure that the citizen can avail information about e-Sampark services from wherever they are.

With the extensive reach of cellular phone, it is convenient for the citizens to know of the different services through their cellular phones. Interestingly chandigarh e-governance surpasses the need of internet connectivity. Amit Chandra, Partner, Barings India, suggested th need for the government to deliver governance to each out the masses through mobile which has large penetration, over 400 million, in the country.
57

E-Jan Sampark Project

Jan Sampark project bridges the digital divide by extending the application of IT for the benefit of the common man. The project e-Jan Sampark was launched in August 2006 by Chandigarh Administration. The e-Jan Sampark project will enable residents to access information and avail services from the kiosks. E-Jan Sampark project specially targets underprivileged citizens, who are without IT connectivity. The benefits of ICT should reach the masses by disseminating useful free information services to the citizens. 70 e-Jan Sampark kiosks are to be set up in each sector and each village of Chandigrh. Submission of applications under the RTI can be given at the Jan Sampark Centres along with the statutory fee in the form of a Demand draft or Indian Postal Order. All such applications will be received and

delivered to the Central Public Information Officer (CPIO) of the concerned Department on the same day. All Procedures and Forms for all departments, which are frequently used by a common man like how to apply for a birth/death certificate including procedure for late entry, how to lodge a FIR, various forms and procedures concerning public offices such as RLA, Estate Office, DC Office, Municipal Corporation, Engineering Wing etc. Education and Health related information services, Transport and Tourism related inquiries, Inquiries relating to Passport status, railway booking status, Train timings etc., Providing access to all Government websites, other information like utility services available in each sector etc., these services are provided free of cost. Nominal cost is charged when the citizen needs any print out. The citizens will also be able to submit their grievances relating to any department at these Centres. Jan Sampark is providing a single, efficient information

dissemination system to the citizen reducing the time spent in such activities. E-Jan Sampark centres give 12 hours service from 8 am to 8 pm everyday expect Sunday. This is a great opportunity for the office going or busy person who can get their services after office time in the evening. Presently 21 e-Jana Sampark centre have been functioning, yet peoples demands are on an increasing graph and also very diverse.

Highlighting success of e-Sampark and e-Jan Sampark centres, Punjab Governor and UT administrator Gen S.F. Rodrigues (retd.) said these centres provide 28 public utility services and have collected about Rs 2,500 crores revenue in nearly 75 lakh transactions since their inception in September 2004.58

E-Gram Sampark
These Centres will emerge as Rural Knowledge Centres for the rural population, Gram Sampark centres, established in the rural areas of Chandigarh to bridge the digital divide, also provide both eSampark and eJan Sampark services. 17 e-Gram Sampark have been planned across all the villages of Union Territory of Chandigarh. The citizens will be able to use all the 15 G2C services which are presently available to the Sampark Centres situated in the urban areas. 59 17 locations have been identified to set up these Centres. These include, Panchayat buildings lying unused and the Gram Sampark Centres will be set up after reconditioning these buildings. These Centres will also have safe drinking water facility, clean toilets, etc., as are available at the Sampark Centres and Jan Sampark Centres in the urban areas.

The department of Information Technology (IT) today stared three new Gram Sampark centers in Palsora, Hallo Majra and Mauli Jagran Village. Such centres have already been established in Khuda Jassu, Dhanas, Kaimbwala, Raipur Kalan, Raipur Khurd, Makhan Majra and Behlana.60 E-governance is a lot more than simply offering online versions of government services. IT shall be used not merely to automate processes but simultaneously simplify procedure and re-engineer processes. Egovernance should bring in the following: Any-where, any-time services to citizens One-stop shop for all transactions in the Government to citizen interface Better accountability, responsiveness and transparency on part of Government employees Improve the efficiency of the government machinery & systems corruption and social well being Reaching the un reached/ underprivileged

E-governance is an opportunity for the government to enhance the productivity of their workers and deliver services more efficiently, leading to economic gwoth. Lives of over a billion people living under poverty line and

earing around fifty rupees a day can be improved if the governments can become different. Not only funds and technology advancements but mindsets of the administrators have to be changed and citizen centric approach is needed if the state of Punjab and UT Chandigarh has to succeed.

CHAPTER-4
ROLE OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN E-GOVERNANCE AND ITS IMPACT ON CITIZEN

We () declare our common desire and commitment to build a people-centered, inclusive and development oriented Information Society, where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information and knowledge, enabling individuals, communities and peoples to achieve their full potential in promoting their sustainable development and improving their quality of life (.) World Summit on the Information society (WSIS), Declaration of Principles, Geneva 2003

Information

and

Communication

Technologies

(ICTs)

have

repeatedly established their potential for alleviating poverty in developing countries. In many occasions, underprivileged people have experienced benefits in the form of; increased earnings; better health care; improved education and training; access to job opportunities; engagement with government services; contacts with family and friends; enterprise development opportunities; increase agricultural productivity, and so on. However, in probably all cases, these experience and so on. However, in probably all cases, these experiences have arisen from highly focused and locally intensive pilog projects that were experimental in nature. Whilst doubts and uncertainties continue to exist with regard to the applicability of

ICTs to the problems of the poor, such projects contribute immeasurably to the growing body of knowledge and experience that is required in order to understand the conditions under which ICTs can be usefully applied to the alleviation of poverty. ICT can make a difference in reducing poverty and in contributing to reaching the Millennium Development Goals1. Projects around the globe demonstrate its potential for enhancing empowerment, opportunity and security. However, to make a significant impact on powerty levels, ICT need to be firmly anchored in broader, more comprehensive and demand driven development strategies. However, the global problem of poverty alleviation is enduring and massive. Achieving the millennium development goal of halving global poverty by 2015 will require an enormous undertaking many orders of magnitude greaer in resource mobilization and complexity than even the most ambitious of the present ICT for poverty alleviation schemes to be found anywhere in the world. In terms of their global impact on the worlds poor population, the effect of the existing initiatives is undertectable. But in many cases their contribution is to show the way in important areas of activity that have emerged as critical factors for improvements in the lives of the poor through the application of ICTs to their problems. We are now beginning for instance, to understand the critical role of community

participation, in addition to institutional transformation, culture specificity, policy-making telecommunications reform, openness in government the need for a suitable legal framwwork and the development of human resources. Generally, there was low impact on the factors that are supposed to lead to some form of social appropriation of the technology; a highly desirable condition whereby users of technology take over its control from the original implementers and design new and unforeseen uses for it. While conducting the study, we did not see this taking place. The expectations of the project users were not well managed. They did not feel that their use of the centres encouraged them to adopt any form of leadership in using the technology. Their technology awareness remained rather low and they did not feel as though the projects were empowering them beyond the immediate benefits. Paradoxically, the overall rating by the users of the quality of service from the centres was also rather low, even though they appreciated the benefits of using them. We speculate that the rural poor appreciate all attempts to improve their lives whilst simultaneously recognizing that more could be done. Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) including the Internet, are generating changes in markets, private and public sectors and economies in the more and less developed world. Some sectoral changes

are to date small. But they are present and advancing in every area of economic, social and political activity. There has been a large wave of investment over the past decade in ICT for development2 (ICT4D), and some significant terms of bringing ICT access poor communities, and in using ICTs in many other ways which support poverty reduction.

E-government
The use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) has dramatically changed government services, business models, and peoples expectations of the quality and efficiency of information sharing and service delivery. The emerging trend in e-Government is design services to focus squarely on the needs of citizens. One of the goals of e-Government in many countries is to consider the web visitor as a customer. By in large, the predominant visitor is the citizen. He or she also may be other government employees. Private businesses, civil society organizations, non-governmental organizations, media organizations, the international donor community and many additional sub-groups. It is difficult to understand the needs of the citizen as a customer. Additionally governments are different from commercial organizations and must

provide services to all of its customers instead of to certain market segments. Governmetn organizations are entrusted with responsibilities to be good stewards of information and develop cost effectives means to capture, store, process, and communicate information for everyone equally. And these customers have no choice about which government to deal with. So, e-Government services must cover the breadth and diversity of individuals who may have a wide range of skills, language abilities, education levels, income and beliefs. According to Shilubane3, electronic government or e-Government is the continuous optimization of government service delivery, constituency participation and governance by transforming internal and external relationships through technology, the Internet and new media. This implies the transformation of how citizens, be they legal or natural persons, perceive and experience government. It is the investigation and formulation of new methods, to enable to public to access government services. The electronic model entails a shift to the customer, where citizens must be able to access more public services online, at their convenience hence at anytime and at any place4. Thus, metrics must be clearly defined and continuous and accurate measurement implemented. E-Government refers to governments use of ICTs to work more effectively, share information and deliver better services to the pblic. E-

Government is more about government- the process of reform and resulting benefits- than about the technology. The resulting benefit can include: increased efficiency in governments functions; greater trust between government and citizens from increased transparency;

empowerment of citizens through access to information; and contributions to overall economic growth. Governments in the Asia- Pacific region are serving a variety of objectives by adopting e-government. Chine is using websites to inform citizens and visitors. India is focused on delivering services electronically either by the government itself or through third parties.

Four decades ago when India faced a major challenge on the food fron we sued biological technologies intelligently to transform a food-deficient country into a food-surplus country in a few years. Indeed, in the early 1960s experts had written off India as a hopeless case. But unmindful of what the experts said, Indian farm scientists worked hard to make the transformation possible of course, the transformation was not brought about just by science and scientists alone; the farmers rose to the occasion and without their courage and fortitude and willingness to try out newer varieties and farm practices any amount of research could not have saved India from severe food shortage. Another equally important factor

was the enlightened political leadership and the support of the bureaucrats; both Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and Food and Agriculture Minister C. Subramaniam6 took the right decisions and extended their full support to the research and extension programes. Looking back, it is clear that without all of these falling in place, without robust partnerships of all key stakeholders, we could not have avoided certain disaster on the food front Today, food security in the developing world, especially in South Asia, is dependent loess on resource-intensive agriculture and more on knowledge intensity Millions of farms families and the rural poor need the right information and knowledge for their very survival. ICT can play a role in bringing about happiness to these people. Many development countries remain poor largely because they had let the Industrial Revolution pass them by. They can ill afford to miss the information technology revolution. Digital happiness requires7: Technology and techno-infrastructure- not just computers and the Internet, but also landline telephones, cellular phones, radio, television, etc. What is needed is a judicious blend of traditional and modern technologies depending on what would work best in a given situation. Content value- added information that the people can use in the immediate context and that can make a difference to their day-to-day lives.

The content must be in the local language so the people will find it easy to use. Gender sensitivity- Men and women may not need the same kind of information. It is important to operate on the principle of social inclusion including the poorest and the most underprivileged. Partnerships-information has to be sourced from different quarters. Expertise is available in different institutions. It is therefore important to partner with a large number of experts and institutions to be able to satisfy the information needs to a community. The poor are often illiterate and have no assets like land, livestock, fish pond or productive skills. Often they survive on uncertain wage labour. Therefore, building assets has to be the major goal of any poverty alleviation effort. Facilitating a paradigm shift from unskilled to skilled work is basic to both poverty reduction and a healthy and productive life. How can we use information and communication technologies (ICT) in poverty alleviation programmes? History has shown that technologies, left to their own devices, will only exacerbate existing differences. Information and communication technologies are no exception. As Jesse Jackson once pointed out, with time the digital divided in the United State is only increasing and it is acquiring the dimensions of a racial ravine, with the relative disadvantage suffered by Blacks and Hispanics in inner cities

increasing all the time. It is essential, therefore, for us to use ICT in a way that would bridge rather than enhance the digial divide. ICT should be sued as a vehicle for imparting market-driven skills through the pedagogic methodology of learning by doing. We have seen in our work in Pondicherry and elsewhere in southern India that the poor are able to take to new technologies like fish to water, if they are enabled to do so through practical training8. The Internet and information and communication technology (ICT) in general have radically changed the way people and businesses communicate and interact with each other. This has particularly applied to the way the private sector of the economy conducts business online. After an initial dry spell, businesses have been able to benefit from increases in productivity, as well as improvements in quality, efficiency, and variety of the services they offer9. Governments in contrast, began to respond to the development of the Internet very late, even though it was based on the initiative of a government agency, namely the U.S. department of defense. However, they are now beginning to catch up by undertaking steps in the Public counterpart of e-business , which will be referred to as egovernment. In a networked economy, both citizens and businesses ask governments for the same level of services they are used to from the

private sector. Within the limits of their ambition to improve efficiency and service, governments have been reasonably successful.10 In Germany, a number of official government websites are already in place, enabling people to download official forms and communicate with the administration electronically. As determined by the initiative

BundOnline 2005, the German government has obliged itself to have all online ready services on the Internet by 2005. But these are first improvement son a long way to go an economys call for action cannot be ignored. The government needs a modern infrastructure in place in order to expand and improve the services currently offered. They need to become faster, more flexible, and more comfortable. In a nutshell: Administrations need to become customer centered and build their offerings around the citizens, not the administrations convenience or bureaucratic routines. From experience it is commonly known that becoming customer centered does not only imply rethinking the services but also restructuring the underlying organizational processes. Hence many government services not only need to be transformed but also adapted, e.g. de-bureaucratized in order to comply with the rules of the Internet. All these developments are technology-enabled and hold a tremendous potential for the IT-and related industries. Practically all big software and hardware vendors, as well as major consulting firms, have

already been assigned a task in an e-government project. Todays complex and tedious administrative proceedings as well as the prevailing in transparencies are primarily based on the vertical organization of isolated departments in public administrations. These structures developed historically, even through the necessity has always existed that they work closely together. The resulting inconveniences and inefficiencies are evident. The internet enables both, administrations and public stakeholders to communicate horizontally. Information can be exchanged more easily, transp[arency increases and decision making becomes significantly faster. In short, e-governmetn re-democratizes the society we live in- also referred to as e-democracy. Once e-government is fully implemented, it will represented one of the most impressive shifts in governance in generations and will offer a fundamental restructuring of the way governments operate and interact with their citizens11. Information and communication technology (ICTs) initiatives to reach the poorest of the poor are still limited in spite of tremendous interest of Governments and developmental organizations. While many such initiatives need to be operational zed within a larger explicated framework that is premised on empowerment, dignity and the preservation of traditional technologies and knowledge, a majority of ICT interventions in rural area have had a technical focus. This technical focus often results

from formal Governmental program thrusts such as infrastructure building, providing access, and of fulfilling connectivity targets. An increasing numbder of attempts at ICT interventions are been reported in lessdeveloped regions of the worlds. However, most of them have reported results from the view pint of the donor agency that supports such efforts. Needless to say, it is understandable, that there would be a bias toward reporting measurable success and downplaying the inhibitors to such initiatives. Moreover, rigorous research that raises and responds to hard questions has been lacking in this area. The link between ICT and ICTenabled benefits in resource challenged environments is a new research area in the context of information systems. The hiatus between the development literature and traditional applied information technology literature is exemplified by the use of the different terms like ICT and information systems. ICT is the dominant term used in literature associated with rural development and the use of computers and networks to respond to poverty. Based on technical, organizational and the managerial studies of several examples, e-government initiatives should be accordingly derived and implemented. In this regard, the four stages of a growth model for egoverndment are described as: (I) cataloguing, (II) transaction, (III) vertical integration, and (IV) horizontal integration. These four stages are explained

below in terms of the complexity and different levels of integration involve. The stages are also depicted in Table 12 1

State

I:

Cataloguing

(online

presence,

catalogue

presentations, downloadable forms)

In this stage, governments crate a state web site. They do not have much internet expertise, and prefer to minimize risks by doing a small project. Parts of the governments non-transactional information are put on the site. Usually at first, the index site is organized on the basis of functions or departments as opposed to service access points. Consequently, if the citizen is unsure of which department he or she is searching for, a search for the necessary agency will be required before being able to obtain the information about the process.

Stage II: Transaction (Services and forms are online, working data
base supporting online transaciton13) This state empowers citizens to deal with their governments online anytime, saving hours of paperwork, the inconvenience of traveling to a government office and time spent waiting in line. Registering vehicles or filing state taxes online is only the beginning of such transaction based services. Consequently, instead of simply having the availability of

downloading a form, and then having to take that form to a state facility, the form can be completed interactively online.

Stage III: Vertical Integration (local systems linked to higher level

systems, within similar functionality) Information is made available through the citizens local portal. The citizen- user will be able to access the service at the state or centre level from the same entry in the local portal, because the local systems are connected to upper level systems, directly or indirectly.

Stage IV: Horizontal Integration (systems integrated across

different functions, real one-stop shopping for citizens) the horizontal integration of government services across different functions of

government will be driven by visions of efficiency and efficiency and effectiveness in using information technology, but pulled by citizens demands for an inside-out transformation of government functions to more service oriented ones. Here e-government offers the best hope for improved efficiencies through administrative reform becuases of both its vertical and horizontal integration. Such integration will facilitate one stop shopping for the citizen. Each organization may have to give up some power to move to this stage.

Methodology
Sample selection and data analysis:
Scheduled questionnaire was distributed randomly in different districts of Punjab. All citizens that were indentified as using any form of electronic service provided by the government were included in the study.

Scale development:

the scale of give was used where 5 is given the

maximum weight age and lesser weight age in decreasing order.

The 30% respondent citizens annual income is less than three lakhs, Other 30% respondent citizens annual income is less than two lakhs, While 25% respondent citizens annual income is less than one lakhs, Only 15% respondent citizens annual income is greater than three lakhs.

Union Territory Chandigarh has topped the country in per capital income. It has increased to Rs 1,10,676 in 2008, as per the quick estimates collected by the UT Economics and Statistics department. 15 Chandigarhs rapid growth can be largely attributed to the expansion of tis tertiary sector comprising trade, hotels and tourism industry, financial services, IT and software and real estate, which contributed 76% to the Gross State

Domestic Product. Infosys, DLF, Parsvnath and other software, property and investment companies have already invested in the city. Chandigarh is one of the seven Union Territories of India and was ranked as one of Indias most prosperous cities in a Ficci-Ernst & Youndg study, India Real Estate Report 2007: Growth and New Destinations 1650% Respondent citizens of Chandigarh annual income is less than three lakhs, 30% Respondent citizens of Chandigarh annucla income is less than two lakhs, 10% Respondent citizens of Chandigarh annual income is less than one lakh. 10% Respondent citizens of Chandigarh annual income is greater than three lakhs.

Dominating citizen respondents are of Sikh Religion 50.02% as the State of Punjabs main religion is Sikhism. The other main population or religion is Hindu of around 32.08%. while Muslims and other religion constitutes of 14.7% and 2.03% respectively.

In Chandigarhs respondent citizens major chunk belongs to Hindu religion, next major population is Sikhs of 20%. While Muslims and other constitutes of 15% and 5% respectively.

The main religions in Chandigarh are Hinduism (78.6%) Sikhism (16.1%), Islam (3.9%), and Chirstainity (0.8%), Hindi and Punjabi are the main languages spoken in Chandigarh.17

In Chandigarh respondent citizens largely belong to government job that is of 62.9%. Private job population is of 32.25%. While farmers and business constitutes 3.22% and 1.61% respectively.

The Gross State Domestic Product of Chandigarh has the highest component of tertiary sector which is around 78.9 per cent at constant prices since 1999-2000, which 75.91 per cent during the year under review (2008). The secondary sector (Industries and manufacturing ) contributed around 20.69 per cent since 1999-2000 with 23.54 per cent in the review year at constant prices. The contribution of primary sector (agriculture and allied activities), which was only 1.22 per cent in 1999-2000, has slipped further to 0.55 per cent in 2007-08 at constant prices.18

In Punjab respondent citizens major occupation is farming, 35% respondent citizen occupation is government job while 15% and 10% population occupation belong to private job and business respectively.

As per Census 2001, Punjabs population is 24.29 million, and the literacy rate is 69.95% Chandigarh has an average literacy rate of 81.9% higher than the national average of 64.8% with male literacy of 86.1% and female literacy of 76.5%.19

In this ample, only 15% of respondent are illiterate. 85% of sample population has received education at least up to matriculation. Now let us examine how many of them are IT users/computer.

In

Punjab

the

education

trend

varies,

illiterates

are

25%

matriculates/higher secondary are 29% , graduates constitutes of 25% and masters are 21%.

Though 85% of population is literate, out of it only 72.22% are IT/computer users. So, only illiteracy is no the reason of lesser usages of e-government services.

On further analysis of 72% IT users or computer users, only 70.2% avails e-government services. The rest 29.98% of sample population hesitates due to technology phobia. This segment of people needs to be targeted to encourage and accept e-government and technological changes.

The target users of e-government may be divided into five major segments of the population viz. The IT (Information Technology) Nerds or Heavy users, General IT users, Education and non IT users, Literates and non IT user, and Illiterate and non IT user, in a progressive manner. The rationale is that the government has limited resources and targeting all the segments in the past has not yielded encouraging results. Many of the existing IT users do not use e-government facilities due to multiple barriers, national as well as real.20

On the scale of 5, the citizen respondent varied on their view regarding give parameters political commitment, administrative leadership, public involvement, IT infrastructure and Database Creation and Operational training/ Computer Education. The response of respondent citizens clearly shows that they consider involvement of public utmost importance. So it can be concluded the citizen feedback and survey conducted can prove beneficial for the successful implementation of egovernance project. Moreover public participation means promoting democracy and good governance. There needs to be a mechanism for input through surveys, on-line questionnaires on what the citizen is looking for from online government and focus groups. These are just three of the means that may be used so

that a government agency, for example in a developing country, can determine that they are going to give the citizens what they want and not what the government officials developing the program think they want.21 Administrative leadership is another major factor is successful implementation of e-government projects. In the administrative system the government employees involved need to be steered to change their mindset so that they can adopt technological changes. Good

administrative leadership can lead to this technological change. Required is changing the mindset of the government employees who are used to working only in the manual mode. This is a big task and needs patience and careful planning. Majority of the people at the authoritative positions in the respective functional departments may dislike the transparent and smooth working after introduction of E-governance initiative. This type of mindset is a hindrance for implementation of E-governance initiatie and adequate steps should be taken to prevent such mindset to influence the process. Resistance of staff is also a very likely aspect which needs to be taken care of by initiating steps in advance and by spreading goodwill among the employees.22 workshops, seminars, and training programmes are required to be organized to spread awareness among the employees at all levels23.

The large population of respondent citizens (58%) replied for awareness of e-government services through newspaper and television. The state level initiative of governemtn to popularize and promote egovernment services has only been 21%. On the other hand informal communication and government official in total have been in total of 12%. Whereas a considerable amount 8.% said they found the services by themselves because the sercices were available at common public places. One more factor that the location of services at common public places served as self promotion. The e-government is being adopted all across the nation for better facilitation of public services. It is a citizen-centric service as a government should be that is of, by and for the citizens. Developing a project is one aspect of e-government the other being a tough is to convince masses to try, avail and trust these e-government facilities. Major concern is that many of current IT users do not avail the e-government services. The success of any plan or programme can be measured by its reach among users. The challenge before government is how to broaden awareness acceptance and usage of e-government services. Setting up useful e-government projects for citizens is a good start, but government managers have to do more if the value of e-Government is to be realized. They also must market these projects to the public. The

primary reason people are not using e-government services more is that they arent aware that the sites even exist. Government managers need to get into the marketing at urgent basis. The media advertisements through newspaper, brochure, TV, messages on public transport and subway, banner in public places road shows and seminars would also increase e-government user population. Advertisement space in bus and railway tickets, electricity bills, tax invoice and receipts and web kiosks will also increase awareness of e-government services. However all the campaigns should be consistent in message content communication to avoid any confusion. Raise awareness among public and private organizations Organize workshops, events, seminars, conferences with the objective or raising awareness about real opportunities and benefits that the ICT revolution can bring. Prepare for long term solutions to problems by ensuring the availability of appropriate training programs for future management of technological business changes.24 As concluded from the analysis of computer/IT users in the sample population a planned strategy for promotion and awareness of literates is also required. Most difficult category of users to handle is illiterate and non IT user. In the first phase, of progressive segmentation, IT nerds category and General IT users category should be targeted. The product can be

such for which these segments do not have to make any additional efforts on hardware or software; also where security issues, psychological uncertainties are mininmal. Some such areas can be road transport offices, employment exchanges, electricity boards, telephone billing, electricity boards, municipal boards etc. Widespread promotional efforts should be made to popularize this among first two segments and if the other segment start using e-government services as a result of this promotion will be a welcome development. In the second phase of progressive segmentation the next two categories educated but non IT users and Literates but non computer users is targeted. The promotional campaign i.e. advertising, sales promotion and public relations will change or slightly adapted and be focused on these new target citizen group. One sufficient numbder of e-governmetn new users i.e. already pre-specified number of target users, is achieved (which can easily be monitored at e-government service touch point), the third and final phase of promotional campaign is started. The last two phases are tough but the conversion rates may be high once the acceptability is built. The rationale is that everyone likes fast, unbiased and convenient

services. One the latter two categories taste the fruits of efficient and quick e-government services there is quite high probability of them converting into regular users. The last segment of Illiterates and non IT

users is most difficult to handle but by the time it reaches them there will be sufficient number of neighborhoods acquainted with e-government utilities.25 The strategic marketing as proposed by Neeraj Pandey and Geetika should be adopted. It will bring awareness and user acceptance of the egovernance projects.

The perception of Quality will be different for different users categories having different needs but the common principles remains the same which are providing the correct needs, at the right time to right people and above all, satisfaction of the user after availing the services. The respondent approximately 30.89% give availability of egovernment projects to masses of society from different strata most important factor in e-government success. Anytime, anywhere availability is considered the most attractive feature of the e-government of project. Second important factor for this chunk is efficiency. 42% respondents also believes in availability most important and second most important is efficiency. Efficiency here implies the time taken to avail a service. Most of the working people opted for availability and efficnecy. In the traditional model of public service delivery, the procedures are long, time consuming and lack transparency. An e-Government initiative

which puts government services online, thereby reducing the bureaucracy, officers round the clock accessibility, fast and convenient transactions with efficiency, obviously enhances the quality of services, in term of time, content and accessibility. The quality of e-government project is ensured by the reduced time that users spend on getting official documents, waiting and queuing to get documents, traveling, as well as more customized products and services, error free documents, and 24*7*356 accessibility.

Quality of services provided by e-governance project has been analyzed on the following factors: Ease of use (like how user friendly is the interface.) Accessibility (like cost incurred to avail the services) Privacy (like keeping the complaint name anonymous or no one else accessing personal information) Local Language (in present case Hindi or Punjabi) Infrastructural facilities (like drinking water, shelter etc.) Ease of use is given the highest importance by the respondents and next in order of preference is local language in which the services should be provided. For any class of users ease can promote the usage of egovernment services. A user friendly interface and educational programs can further enhance the productivity of e-government services.

Supplying information to the public in a language that they understand and are comfortable with, and generally, it is the local language. Technology is available by which transliteration from English into other languages can be made. Therefore, the problem is manageable provided there is enough motivation to do this onerous task.26 The respondents of Punjab were served a questionnaire of list of services provided by SUWIDHA Centers. The most frequently used services by the respondents are: Issuance of Copy of documents is the most frequently used services at SUWIDHA Centers, as clearly shown 22% of population issuance of copy of document sis most frequently used services as well as of another 32% population but both the population differ at second most frequently availed service. For 22% counter signing of documents / NOC is the second frequently availed service while for 32% driving license and registration is more requently availed service. Large chunk of population around 46% availed issuance of affidavits/ indemnity bonds service most frequently. The second more frequently service was issuance of copy of document. The service of issuance of copy of document is the most frequently aviled service. Earlier the citizens had to bribe the officials to get a copy of document and had to make at least two trips to get this done. With this service the citizens are very satisfied as there requirement is

immediately met driving license which earlier took 10-15 days is now able to deliver Driving licenses and Vehicle Registration Certificates in 45Minutes.27 Majority of population ranked payment of electricity bill as the most frequently used service. Similarly the tax payment has been ranked top most used service by 47% of citizens and second frequently used service is payment of electricity bill. Even the payment of phone bills has been third frequently used service by 47% and 33% of citizens. From the above analysis, the findings are: Citizens need to be made aware of benefits of e-governance. Certain marketing strategies are required to be planned at State level to promote e-governance. Making citizens to instill faith in electronic version of government services. Primary concerns are reliability, privacy and security that are the reasons behind people availing only basic services through SUWIDHA centers and e-Sampark centers. Administrative mindset change to adopt technology is needed. Political environment especially in case of Punjab is very changing as trend shows every five years it switches from one government to

other. This change should not affect the e-governance development. So political commitment is required. The e-government should benefit every category of public uniformly. It should reach the unreached. Local Language is preferred by rural citizens. Target the literates who are not adopting the technology. The most difficult segment to target is illiterate non IT/computer users.

CHAPER 5
CONCLUSION

Though a slew of positive attributes/ impacts of different egovernance projects have been observed at the grass root level in the course of this study, a number of inhibiting factors or constraints too have come to the fore. Ideas from early experiments in e-governance have definitely contributed to technology development as well as to the improvement of government practices. A recent NASSCOM report puts e-Governance in India1 as a rapidly growing segment with three southern states (Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and Tamil Nadu) making significant progress. It however, suggests that to achieve desired benefits to address the operational, economic, personnel, planning and implementation issues, which are the bottlenecks to effective implementation of e-Governance. Ongoing research considers how various factors influence whether or not an individual citizen will use an e-Government system. Successful eGovernment depends on two factors the willingness of citizens to adopt and use the online service and the ability of the government to implement e-Government to match the needs of the citizen and web visitor2. The research examining the adoption and use of e-Government applies theories based on the Diffusion of Innovations and technology acceptance.

Challenges before Stakeholders

E-Governance is expected to help deliver cost-effective and easy-toaccess citizen services, and improve processing of transactions both within the government, and between the government and other agencies. The stakeholder in e-governance include government officials, legislators, regulatory agencies, citizens, voluntary organizations, funding agencies, and the media. In short, anybody interested in the application of ICT for governance. Loads of hard work has been put in the establishment of infrastructure and in-house information handling by administration and government bodies as well as civic services, the transmission of technologies in moving towards e-governance have been relatively sluggish. This may principally be accredited to the following reasons:

Lack of Information Technology Literacy and knowledge concerning benefits of e-governance

There is common need of knowledge regarding benefits of egovernance as well as the procedure drawn in putting into operation successful Government Citizen, Government-Government and

Government Business projects. The governmental structure is not geared for maintaining, storing and retrieving the governance information

electronically. The general tendency is to obtain the data from the files (print) as and when required rather than using Document Management and workflow technologies. Lately the use of DMS and workflow technologies has been able to find its use only in those departments where there is perceptible lightening of workload of the subordinate staff.

Underutilization of existing ICT infrastructure

To a larger extent, the computers in the department are used for the purpose of word processing only, resulting in the underutilization of the computers in terms of their use in data mining for supporting management decisions. The time gap between the procurement of the hardware and development of the custom applications is so large that by the time application is ready for use, the hardware becomes obsolete.

Attitude of Government Departments

The psychology of government servants is quite different from that of private sectors. Traditionally the government servants have drived their sustenance from the fact that they are important repositories of government data. Thus any effort ot implement DMS and workflow

technologies or bringing out the change in the system is met with resistance from the govt. servants.

Lack of coordination between Govt. Department and Solution developers

Designing of any application requires a very close interaction between the govt. department and the agency developing the solutions. At present the users in government department do not contribute enough to design the solution architecture. Consequently the solution developed and implemented does not address the requirements of an e-governance project and hence does not get implemented.

Lack

of

Infrastructure

for

sustaining

e-governance

projects on national level

Infrastructure to support e-governance initiatives does not exist within government departments. The agony is that the government departments are not equipped to be in a position to project the sector. Whatever efforts have been made by various govt. organizations may be defined as islands of computerization. The infrastructure creation is not guided by a uniform national policy, but is dependent on the needs of

individual officers championing a few projects. Therefore, the require networking and communication equipment is either nonexistent in govt. departments, or if it exists at all, it does not serve any tangible puporse as far as the requirement of e-governance project is concerned. The use of econnectivity options provided by government agencies like NICNET etc. are used in a very limited manner for data transmission purpose between various location viz. District, State, Center etc. and is mainly utilized for email and Internet purpose only. There are shortcomings within current research and reporting on the use of ICT for poverty reduction that inhibit the continued actions required to make ICTs fully capable of overcoming poverty on a wide scale.

These can be summarized as follows:

Vagueness about which ICTs are most appropriate under which circumstances Excessive reliance on processed knowledge and insffcient first hadn accounts. Insfficient explanation of the contextual circumstances and precondition necessary to make ICTs effective

 Inadequate explanation of the respective roles of the private and public sectors Absence of explanation of why ICTs are or are not chosen in particular development circumstances Paucity of solid evidence linking ICT to poverty reduction

In the rural citizen centric application, citizens noticed slippage in response times to their applications. Connectivity and power supply often became serious constraints. Possibly so services could have been designed not to use these technologies in such environment. The backend systems required re-engineering, computerization and networking. This is the most challenging task and needed more efficient and strongly motivated project leaders.

Suggestions:
To sum up, ICT for development is not jus an additional theme of fashionable tool. ICT have drastically changed access to information and knowledge and transformed the way people communicate and network. Developing countries and disadvantage people must not be deprived of opportunities with the argument that

other basic needs have to be satisfied first. To the contrary, ICT have to be used in a smart way to meet basic needs more efficiently.

To

make

ICT

work

for

poverty

reduction

and

development, it needs
1. An adequate ICT infrastructure at affordable costs, building on an enabling regulatory environment, innovations, domestic and international investment, and 2. comprehensive multi stakeholder efforts to support the poor disadvantaged and marginalized people at all levels to use the whole range of ICT according to their priorities and demand. 3. More clarity with regard to the circumstances under which the private sector may or may not be instrumental in reducing poverty with ICTs. 4. More convincing empirical evidence of the role ICTs play in reducing poverty. 5. Clearer definition of the facilitating conditions that allow ICTs to be effective and how these conditions were created more

clarity concerning which ICTs have been effective in reducing poverty and how they were used 6. Better understanding of which o the many dimensions of poverty ICTs are capable of reducing most achieving these objective will lead to more useable knowledge that can foster greater readiness to embed ICTs into poverty reduction prorammes3. 7. Governments, in cooperation with the private sector, should prevent, detect and respond to cyber crime and misuse of ICTs. 8. Take appropriate action on spam at national and international levels. 9. Furether strengthen the trust and security framework with complementary and mutually reinforcing initiatives in the fields of security in the use of ICTs. 10. Identify security requirements and propose solutions for the development of secure IP infrastructure for e-

services/applications on various types of networks using relevant technologies. 11. Encourage further development of secure and reliable applications to facilitate online transactions.

12.

Empowering Development through : a) Improving quality of life. B) Secure ICT applications. C) Facilitating entry into the information Technology. D) Meeting the Millennium

Development goals. 13. The recommendations for effective e-governance include: Develop a strategic plan to guide e-Government services; Understand the needs of all segments of public to make sure the e-government system genuinely assist each citizen to fulfill his or her human development needs; and, enable citizens to participate in the design of eGovernment services; Use well established system development practices to carry out the day-to-day activities of developing,

implementing and maintaining e-Government services; Create a learning organization where employees are encouraged to participate in developing and managing eGovernment services; Develop effective ICT governance mechanisms to assign roles and responsibilities for managing and making decisions about e-Government services;

 Develop ICT capabilities focusing on building a suitable ICT infrastructure to sustain long term investments in eGovernment, nurturing the development of human capital with the government to use ICTs for e-Government, and facilitating the skills of employees to develop and manage partnerships with private sector firms and other possible partners; Provide a secure experience for web visitors by developing an e-Government security and disaster recovery plan.

Lastly, a word of caution on any over-hyped expectations that a literature of this king may create. As discussed earlier, e-governance is not a mere technology solution. No one should be in doubt that technology alone cannot solve issues of poor governance, corruption and frustrations of the citizens. Corruptions may easily trun into e- corruption, bad government may become e-bed governments and the rising users frustrations may turn into e-frustrations if the bureaucrats blame the computers for their poor performances. Therefore for the e-governance to succeed, a broader reform agenda is required, Government organizations must turn into knowledge institutions, to match with the requirement soft e emerging knowledge-age,

in which India is coming up as a dark horse benefiting from the digitization and the broadband revolutions4, setting a trend in the transfer of services sector jobs from the developed countries to Bangalere and other cities in the country. Political leaders have to aggressively move forward to initiate cutting edge institutional reforms and they have to put in charge, a set of passionate officials, who have the necessary qualifications to execute a plan of action to make wider changes within the government.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Human Development report published by the United Nations Development Programme has been consistently recommending for good governance and strong institutions for fostering economic growth5. The citizens of the world certainly deserve better governments in their home countries, and e-governance has just arrived at the right time to meet those heightened expectations.

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www.mdpesa.co.zw

Municipal

Development

Programme for Eastern and www.decentralization.org www.digitalgovernance.org www.egov.mit.gov.in Southern Africa World Bank Institute A virtual Initiative of Vikash Nath Ministry of Information

Technology Government of www.iicd.org India International Communication www.012000.nl www.overheid.nl www.belastingdienst.nl www.inasp.org.uk Institute for and

Development Overheidsloket 2000 Dutch Government: Access to all government Dutch tax administration Internationa Network for the Availability of Scientific

www.bestpractices.org www.ecitizen.gov.sg www.worldbank.org/publicesector/ego v

Publications UNCHS website Singapore Government website World Bank links

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S. 2001). Toward a Knowledge System for Sustainable Food Security. OnTheInternet, March/April 2001. Balakrishan, S. & Ramnathan R. (2000). State of the Art as Art of the State: Evaluating E-Governance Initiatives through Citizen Feedback. Public Affairs Centre, Bangalore, June 2000. Best, M.L. & Maclay, C. M (2002). Community Internet Access in Rural Areas: Solving the Economic Sustainability Puzzle. The Global Information Technology Report 2001-2002: Readiness for the Networked World, Oxford University Presss: Bhantnagar, S. (2003). Administrative Corruption: How Does E-

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ANNEXURES

ANNEXURE 1
Questionnaire for Citizens of Punjab Name Caste: Sikh Hindi Muslim Other Education: 1. Post-Graduate 2. Graduate 3. Matriculation/ Higher secondary 4. Illiterate Occupation: 1. Government Job 2. Private job 3. Farmer 4. Business Annual Income: 1. Less than 100000 2. Less than 200000 3. Less than 300000 4. Above 300000

Questionnaire for Citizens of Punjab

Which of these services provided at SUWIDHA Centers have you frequently used? (Out of these nineteen services rank those which have been most frequently availed by you)
Sr. No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Service Name Arm Licenses related Services Services to Pensioners Counter Signing of Documents/ Issuances of No Objection Certificate Character Verification Issuances of Bus Passes Issuance of Dependent Certificate Issuance of Unmarried Certificate/ Issuance of Marriage Certificate Issuance of Licenses Endorsement of SPA/GPA Issuance of Nationality Certificate Issuance of Copy of a Document Issuance of ID-Card appointment of Numbderdar Driving License related Services/ Registration Issuance of Birth Certificate/ Issuance of Death Certificate Issuance of Affidavits/ Issuance of Indemnity onds Issuance of Permissions Issuance of Surety Bonds Submission of Passport Applications

ANNEXURE 1
Questionnaire for Citizens of Chandigarh Name Caste: Sikh Hindi Muslim Other Education: 1. Post-Graduate 2. Graduate 3. Matriculation/ Higher secondary 4. Illiterate Occupation: 1. Government Job 2. Private job 3. Farmer 4. Business Annual Income: 1. Less than 100000 2. Less than 200000 3. Less than 300000 4. Above 300000

Questionnaire for Citizens of Punjab

Which of these services provided Sampark have you

frequently used? (Out of these nineteen services rank those which have been most frequently availed by you)

Sr. No. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

Service Name Issue of Disability Identity Card Services of old age persons Pension Telephone Bill Payment Payment of Electricity Bill Issuances of Bus Passes Payment of taxes Issuance of Senor Citizen Card Disbursement of pension for widows and disabled persons. Issaunce of Birth Certificate/ Issuance of Death Certificate Space bookings Tenant Registration Domestic Servant Registration Passport Application Submission Chandigarh Housing Board- Sale & Receipt of Forms Payment of Water & Sewerage Bills General, Sticker and Postal Challan Sale of stamp paper, stamps and adhesive stamps Doctors appointment for patient at

19

GMSH and GMCH Booking of tubewell for irrigation in rural area

ANNEXURE 3
Common Questionnaire for Citizens of Punjab and Chandigarh Q1 Are you a computer/ IT user? If yes, have you ever used it to

avail E-government services? A. (a) Yes (b) No Q2. How will you rate the following Factors in order of preference, necessary fo successful implementation of e-governance? Factors Scale of Five Political commitment Effective administrative leadership Public/citizens involvement in the form of surveys or feedback IT infrastructure and database creation Operational Training/ education
Q3. Which factors do you consider of more importance in quality of

Service on the scale of 5? Factors Quality of Service Ease of use Accessibility Privacy Local language Infrastructural facilities Scale (1 to 5)

Q4. Which factors do you consider of more importance in quality of eGovernance projects on the scale of 5? Factors Quality of Governance Transparency, Participation, Availability (anywhere, anytime) Responsiveness Efficiency Scale (1 to 5) `

Q5. How you become aware of e-government services? Medium Newspaper or television Advertisements Neighbors and relatives Government officials Nobody, I found it myself Tick against the option (only one)

ANNEXURE -4 Administrative Structure of Punjab

Divisions District Sub-Divisions/ Tehsils Sub-Tehsil Blocks No. of Inhabited Villaged (2001 Census) No. of Towns (2001 Census) No. of Cities (2001 Census) 4 20 76 77 141 12278 143 14

Population 2001

Total Population Rural Population (in Lakh) Urban Population (in Lakh) Density (Per Sq. Km.)

243.59 160.96 82.6 484

Local Bodies (2005-2006)

Zila Parishads Municipal Committees Improvement Trusts 17 133 20

Climate (2005)
Average Rainfall (Millimeter) 435.6

Area, Average yield & Production of selected Crops. (2005-2006) Area (000, hec) Rice Wheat Maize Bajra Gram Sugarcane Rapeseed Mustard Sunflower Groundnut Cotton 2642 3468 148 5 4 84 & 48 19 4 557 Prod. tons) 10193 14493 406 5 4 486 54 30 3 2395 (000, Average yield

(Kg. per hec.) 3858 4179 2726 1045 864 5783 1108 1578 871 731

Co-operatives (2005-2006)
No. of cooperative Societies 20875

Membership (lakh) Working Capital (Crore) No. of Primary Agriculture Credit

47.17 26380.51 3978

Irrigation (2005-200)
Net Area Irrigated by: Grass Area Irrigated Government Canals Private Canals Wells/ Tubewells Other 000 Hectare 7680 1134 4 2914 8

Energy (2005-2006)
Consumption of Electricity Per capital Consumption Electricity 24192 Millon of 906 KWH

Forests (2005-2006)
Area under Forests (Sq. K.M) 3054

Industries (2005)
Working Factories 15301 Average No. of Workers employed 521337 in Regd. Working factories

Medical and Health (01.04.2006)

Hospitals 219

Dispensaries P.H.C.s. Ayurvedic and Unani Institutions Homoepthic Institution Beds installed in Medical Institutions (Allopthy)

1453 441 529 107 25489

Animal Husbandry (2005-2006)

Veterinary Hospitals Outlying Dispensaries Inseminaiotn Total Poultry (Thousands) Area Stocked with fish (in hec.) Total Livestock (Thousands) 1367 & 1485 10779 9890 8608

Education (30.09.2005)
Universities No. of Arts, Home 6 Science, 232

Commerce and Science College No. of High Schools/ Senior 4043 Secondary Schools No. of Middle Schools No. of Primary Schools 2481 13291

Banking (31.12.2005)
Scheduled Bank Non-Scheduled Bank 2807 2

Miscellaneous (2005-2006)
Post Offices Police Stations/ Police Post Seats in Punjab Vidhan Sabha Lok Sabha Seats in Punjab Rajya Sabha Seats in Punjab 3952 456 117 13 7

Source: - Statistical Abstract of Punjab 2006