Twenty Indian e-Government projects, implemented by National Informatics Centre were felicitated with the Oracle Excellence in e-Governance awards at the Oracle Open World held in Mumbai during January this year.
The underlying theme of the awards was ‘Enabling Citizen Service Delivery and Innovations’. The awards were given in nine different categories including IT for efficiency, IT for Service Delivery, IT for Revenue, Capacity Building and IT for Globalising India.
The projects were assessed by a renowned assessment agency, Skoch Consultancy Services, which in its presentation at the award ceremony, stated that NIC is the biggest provider of e-Governance solutions across the country controlling over 22% market directly and another 40% of the market will use NIC applications or services in the coming years. Sh. Derek Williams, Executive Vice President, Oracle Asia-Pacific praising the efforts of NIC said, “Our awards recognise the e-government projects which are not only exemplary for their effectiveness in India but they also meet global standards of government work-flow automation and citizen services delivery”.
The award for ‘Leading the Change’ was conferred to Dr. N Vijayaditya for his vision, leadership and the role he has played in computerizing various sectors like Treasuries, Customs, Passport, Judiciary, Transport, etc across the country, and for initiating projects that have touched the lives of millions of people, such as ASHA in Assam, e-Kosh in Chattisgarh, VICTORY in Bihar, CARD in Andhra Pradesh, Rural e-Seva in West Godavari District and many more.
Various NIC projects that won awards are: • e-Panchayat - NIC Andhra Pradesh • e-AWAS - Government Accommodation Management System, NIC HQ • Computerization of Directorate of Pension, PF and Group Insurance – NIC West Bengal • CARD - Computer Aided Administration of Registration Department – NIC Andhra Pradesh • Vahan and Sarathi – NIC Jharkhand • LRMIS - Land Records Management Information System – NIC Andhra Pradesh • e-Kosh - Online Treasury Computerisation – NIC Chhattisgarh • Treasury Computerization System – NIC Rajasthan • ITSANIC- Integrated Treasury System Application of NIC – NIC Uttar Pradesh • IMPACT - Information Management and Promotion of Administration in Commercial Taxes – NIC West Bengal • DC-CMS - District Courts Case Management System – COURTNIC, NIC HQ. • Rural e-Seva - NIC Andhra Pradesh • ICES - Indian Customs EDI System – NIC HQ. • PLI & RPLI - Postal Life Insurance, Rural Postal Life Insurance – NIC HQ. • Computerization of PAY & ACCOUNTS OFFICE - NIC Gujarat • FAIS - Integrated Financial Accounting System – NIC Kerala • ASHA – Assam Small Farmers’ Agribusiness Consortium – NIC Assam • VICTORY - VAT Information Computerization to Optimise Revenue Yields - NIC, Bihar • ICS - Immigration Control System – NIC HQ. • PCIS - Passport Control and Issuance System - NIC HQ.
The projects were judged, on the basis of parameters such as Effectiveness, Innovation, Relevance, Significance and Replicability by a panel of judges including Dr. D B Phatak, IIT Mumbai and Dr. Gulshan Rai, ED, ERNET.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr. N Vijayaditya, DG NIC said, ‘Consumption of ICT has unique challenges in the Government domain. Our challenge is to make a change, embedding our applications in the user community’.
NIC e-Governance Projects were also in the limelight at the National e-Governance Awards function held in Kochi (Kerala) during the 9th National e-Governance Conference in February 2006.
NIC Projects bagged four Gold, two Silver and three Bronze Icon Awards in the four different categories - Process Re-engineering, Service Delivery, Innovative Practices, and ICT Achievement of the year.
Sh. M K Muneer, Hon’ble Minister for Public Works, Govt. of Kerala, distributed the awards, which have been constituted by the Department of Administrative Reforms & Public Grievances and Department of Information Technology, and are given for exemplary initiatives in the field of e-Governance.
The nominees were judged by a panel of experts on various parameters such as Strategic Planning and Implementation, Information and Analysis, Human Resource Focus, Process Management, Performance and Results.
In the ‘Professional Excellence for Process Re-Engineering’ category following projects were awarded: • HIMRIS – Himachal Registration Information System - Golden Icon • Koshvani – Maharashtra – Silver Icon • Dharitree – Assam – Bronze Icon • HALRIS – Haryana – Bronze Icon
In ‘Exemplary Leadership and ICT Achievement of the Year’ category, ASHA (Assam) won the Golden Icon award.
‘Outstanding Performance in Service delivery’ awards were conferred to: • Lokvani – Uttar Pradesh – Golden Icon • Vahan – Jharkhand – Silver Icon
Awards in the category ‘Innovative Operations and Best Practices’ were given to: • e-Pension - Himachal Pradesh - Golden Icon • Result through Binocular – Haryana – Bronze icon
Dataquest e-Gov Champion Award 2006 Sh. S B Singh, STD & SIO, NIC UP State Unit, Lucknow was honoured with the ‘Dataquest e-Governance Champion Award 2006’ for the northern region.
The Award is the first of its kind in India to recognise individuals for championing the cause of e-Governance in the country. It comes in addition to the Transformation Leadership Samman 2005 received by Sh. S B Singh from Lucknow Management Association in November 2005.
A jury comprising of industry experts, senior government officials, academicians and civil society selected Sh. Singh as the e-Gov Champion for developing and executing models that suit the needs of the industry, government and the citizens as well as for driving a highly motivated team of more than 200 IT professionals in Uttar Pradesh. These initiatives have helped in achieving ‘Good Governance’ in the state through ICT implementation.
As per Dataqest, the aim and purpose of organising the ‘e-Gov Champion Award’ is to recognise, encourage and further disseminate novel e-Governance practices and delivery. The award recognises innovative e-gov solutions that break the traditional mode of public delivery mechanisms in day-to-day governance. It is part of a nation building exercise for driving high societal impact in bridging the digital divide, information gap and bringing in transparency in the governance process thereby enabling the country to meet the Millennium Development Goal of ‘Good Governance’.
For more information, contact anshu.rohatgi@nic.in