e-Governance - Vision and Priorities

Sh. R Chandrashekhar, Additional Secretary (e-Governance), talks to Informatics about the vision of Indian Government behind the e-Governance initiatives and the critical factors for their success…

Q: Government has set a vision to make India an IT Super power by 2008. What role does e-Governance play towards the realization of this vision ?

RC: Being an IT super power is not only about having a broad range of IT capabilities or a vast number of skilled people. The vision of an IT superpower is also one of a Country which uses IT extensively for its own development, progress and efficiency within the country. e-Governance plays a very major role in this, particularly in terms of encouraging proliferation of resources in the Country. Use of technology in the government, economy and society have a great synergy with each other. In the absence of progress in one sphere, it is very difficult to imagine major progress taking place in the other spheres. Quite often, e-governance can act as a significant trigger or a catalyst for progress in different spheres. Another point is that in case of e-governance, the entire development effort largely has to be done within the country, which gives an opportunity to our IT industry to work at the highest end of projects.

Q: How significant is National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) in bridging the digital divide in the Country ?

RC: NeGP broadly has two major aims, first to make government services available electronically. And second, to enable the common man, in particular the citizens in rural areas, to have access to such services. In a country like India where we have Assisted Community Access, the implication of this is that while creating the access of government services, you are also creating access to all other kinds of services, which could be developmental, economic, employment generating or maybe even in the area of entertainment, because the pipe for communication and access is the same. Therefore in the attempt to create and make these services available, we would also be bridging the digital divide to a significant extent as a part of the NeGP.

Q: What is the Government's vision behind setting up Core infrastructure for e-gov implementation including 100,000 rural Common Service Centres and SWANs across the Country ?

RC: Basically the government is concerned about making services available electronically, not just in cities and by well-to-do people who can afford computers but also by those who are not well off and in the rural areas. So the wide area networks aim to push the connectivity right upto the villages. The government has also set up universal service obligation fund to provide connectivity to rural areas but from our point of view, we look at services and connectivity as being hand in hand. One without the other is not of much use. The other key reason why we would like to have most of these CSCs and SWAN in place by the second half of 2008 across most of the country because there is always a debate on which comes first, services or infrastructure. The short answer to that is neither comes first and neither can exist in the absence of other. If you just create the infrastructure and not have any services, it would be a waste of resources. On the other hand, if you create the services and not have the infrastructure, then nobody can avail these services. So while DIT has initiated this programme and a lot of Public Private Partnership has been used in the creation of this infrastructure, there is a need to work at the back-end with the departments to create the services in tandem. So that by the time infrastructure is ready, services are also ready. Initially of course there will be fewer services but they will grow with time.

Q: How far have the Mission Mode Projects under the NeGP progressed and how would they make a difference to the lives of common citizens in the Country. Do you have any personal favorites among Mission Mode Projects?

RC: A lot of ministries and departments, both at centre and states have been covered under the mission mode projects. While significant progress has been made in the use of IT to bring about internal efficiency as well as in digitization of data, in most of the cases we are at a very preliminary stage in terms of actually making services available remotely. This is really the next level that we have to reach. Among these projects, my favorites are all those which are delivering the services because that is really where the true work is being made visible on the ground. I would therefore feel that the best referee of the services is the common man who has actually availed of the services. In central projects, we have examples like Income tax, passport, company affairs. In states there are areas like land records, transport, registration etc. In several of these projects and states, people have begun to see the benefits. That is why the government is putting emphasis on these areas. Because government policies don't exist in a vacuum. They are reinforced by citizen feedback, citizen pressure and media. All of these have to be seen as healthy indicators of progress and that's where one can attempt to emulate the good efforts.

Q: What does the future hold for the e-Gov scenario in our Country?

RC: With the kind of emphasis being placed on e-governance, obviously, it will become more important as we move forward. A key question would really be how to measure the progress being made. To my mind there are two main indicators; first, the percentage of government services being made available electronically and secondly, the percentage of people who have access to these services. This is the true measure of the progress of e-governance and our aim should be to maximize both of these. Another key point is that as we move from IT to E-governance, the nature of the efforts that need to be made have changed. We are no longer talking about use of IT or even e-Governance. It is about transformation, i.e transforming the processes by which the government functions, interacts and delivers the services. As this transformation is sought, what becomes critically important is the vision of the people who head the domains. It is therefore very important for people who head organisations to have a clear vision, not necessarily an IT vision but on how the organization should develop in the new era. That kind of leadership from within the domain is a critical element and will determine the speed and effectiveness of progress in e-governance.

Q: What has been NIC's contribution towards the progress of e-governance ?

RC: I would be stating the obvious if I were to say that NIC has been responsible for a large part of progress made in the area of e-governance in the country. That's known to everyone and is a well established fact. Yet, there are changes taking place in the environment around us which have a significant impact on the qualitative aspects i.e the nature of the role which needs to be played. In the past, NIC has played a sterling role in inducting technology, establishing networks and infrastructure, developing applications and software, managing data and information of government. In short, it has been a one stop shop for every IT need of the government. Today the scenario has changed for two major reasons - First, the needs of the government has multiplied several fold. In that sense, it is the earlier efforts of NIC which have led to this increase. Secondly, there has been a vast growth in capability and skills outside of the government and we have over 2 million IT professionals outside of government. The need is to recognize this and adapt to the change. While the government needs to use these outside skills to meet the increased demand, there are some aspects that it needs to be careful about. For eg, the government needs to ensure continued control over the data which will increasingly become digital and today that is a major area of threat. Another consideration is in terms of creation of infrastructure. Today there is a lot of capability outside of government to create infrastructure and it should be used. But even while doing that, government would need to maintain control over the entities that are setting up and creating that infrastructure and the right kind of control can be exercised only by a competent organization like NIC. Similarly in case of applications, irrespective of who develops them, government needs to retain an appropriate and adequate degree of strategic control on a long term basis. That is the kind of a role which an organization like NIC is expected to play. We are entering an era where challenges of security and control are major areas. As the main technical arm of the government, obviously the responsibility of ensuring the continued control would largely rest on an organization like NIC.