Kannur, the land of Looms and Lore has a rich history and has been a favourite destination of many ancient travellers. Now, the district is one of the frontrunners in the Kerala State in adopting new technologies and in using ICT effectively for good Governance.
DC*Suite, Services portal, Industry Portal and other such ICT initiatives substantiate NIC Kannur's efforts towards effective e-Governance.
Asha Verma Kerala Correspondent asha@kerala.nic.in
Since its inception in 1988, NIC Kannur has developed and implemented various MIS and Decision Support Systems for better district administration. This has resulted in informed decisions, formulation of comprehensive plans, follow-up on delivery of public services, and creation of user-friendly public infrastructures.
The various e-governance projects successfully implemented by NIC Kannur District are cited below:
DCSuite The DCSuite project, conceived by NIC, bagged the CSI Nihilent e-Governance Award for the year 2006-07 for the Best e-Governance Project. Based on an integrated solution architecture covering all functional areas and activities in the Collectorate, the programme aims at making all services easily accessible to the citizens. This G2G project with G2C components is implemented and contributed to the decentralised development of DCSuite modules. Kannur is a member of the core committee of DCSuite. Kannur is the first district in Kerala to provide the File/Tapal status through SMS Service from DC*Suite. Other key features of this programme include Open Source software for paperless office management, Video Conference facility, Touch Screen Services, Connectivity to taluk offices etc.
Inauguration of DC*Suite Project and Manual Release by Hon'ble. Home Minister
Kannur Services Portal The portal http://www.kannurservices.gov.in is a common platform for hosting all the e-Governance services provided by the district administration. DC*Suite Internet services is also part of the Portal. Services like Beneficiary list under various Central and State schemes for the financial year 2006-07 from all the 81 Village Panchayats, 9 Block Panchayats and 5 Municipalities; information on hospital facilities, district mental health programmes, and other vital statistics are provided in the portal.
kannurservices.gov.in
Kannur Industry Portal (http://kannurindustry.gov.in) Kannur Industry Portal is a Content Management System designed to promote Small Scale Industries in the district. The portal provides space for SSI registered units to create their web pages. This is a collaborative effort of District Collector, District Industries Centre, Akshaya and NIC.
District Collector Smt. Ishita Roy, IAS releasing the first content CD of the portal
Bhurekha - Land Records Computerisation The district administration and NIC joined hands to evolve a method for the implementation of Land Records Computerisation called Bhurekha. Later named as 'Kannur Model', it was replicated by the State Government in the six northern districts of Kerala. Over 13 Lacs landholdings data across 129 villages in 3 taluks were digitised.
Capacity Building As part of DC*Suite, initiatives were taken by NIC Kannur to train all employees in the Collectorate for using IT tools. With the introduction of Open Source technologies in the Collectorate and Taluk Offices, continuous trainings were arranged for district and taluk officials.
Building Tax Extending ICT to taluk offices, a Building Tax Assessment & Collection Monitoring System (BTAS) was developed that has resulted in effective management of the collection monitoring process.
State Level Projects implemented in Kannur VAHAN SARATHI extended, as SMART MOVE is online in the Regional Transport Office (RTO) and its sub offices. SPARK for pay roll and employee administration covered 4 Revenue establishments. PEARL in all 23 Sub Registrar Offices and TetraPDS for the Civil Supplies department were implemented. MIS for Animal Husbandry and Education department are operational. Online Treasury Information System is successfully implemented in two district treasuries and sub treasuries The District Centre was involved in the Election process with its Election Management Systems.
Thematic Atlas: The e-Book of Kannur (thematic Atlas) with 130 themes was released in 2006. The spatial layers, demographic layers and sectoral layers including education, medical, communication, recreation, etc were included in the atlas which is used by the planning & statistics department.
Excerpts from a letter by Smt. Ishita Roy IAS, District Collector & District Magistrate “NIC has spearheaded the implementation of DC*Suite in the Collectorate and have enabled us to achieve a few milestones within a short span of time. Launching the SMS services, launching of District Services portal, capacity building programmes to the revenue staff are a few examples. The recent introduction of District Services Portal has brought more transparency in the delicacy of services to the citizens by the district administration.”