Tirunelveli District, the penultimate southernmost district of Tamil Nadu, is a microcosm of the state with all the 5 geographical divisions referred in the Tamil literature: Kurinji (Mountains), Mullai (Forests), Marudham (Cultivable Lands), Neithal (Coastal area) and Palai (Desert). Tirunelveli is one of the biggest districts in the state with 11 taluks. Total population of the district is 27,23,988. The district has large number of educational institutions. Hence, the title of ‘Oxford of South India’.
NIC Tirunelveli District Unit: NIC Tirunelveli District Unit was established on 30th August 1988. Since then the centre has been promoting ICT culture at grass root level.
Major ICT Projects
• Tamil Nilam (Tamil Nadu Infosystem on Land Administration and Management): Tamil Nilam has been implemented in all 11 taluk offices. It contains data related to more than 18 lakh land parcels and 16 lakh landowners. More than 1 lakh Land Ownership certificates have been issued through the system in the last 2 years. Interconnectivity has been established between taluk office and the respective Sub Registrar office in 5 taluks using LAN. This enables quick exchange of land transaction details between the two offices. Sub-registrar can see the ownership details before registration. Touch Screen Kiosks have been installed at 4 taluk offices. Public can view land ownership, birth/death records etc using the kiosks. Entire user interface is in Tamil.
• Treasury System: The system developed by the State Centre has been implemented in district treasury and all 11 sub treasuries. Pension disbursal system developed by Tirunelveli district has been replicated in all other districts. Details relating to more than 25,000 government pensioners are maintained in the system.
• Certificates Management System at Taluks: Land ownership, birth, death, residential, legal-heirship and income certificates are being issued through computers in all Taluks.
• Old Age Pension Disbursal System: More than 24,000 pensioners details are maintained in the system.
• Grievances Redressal System: The grievances system has been web enabled to show the status of the action taken on petitions.
• Scholarship disbursement system: Particulars of SC/ST students in schools and colleges are maintained for calculation of scholarship amounts to be disbursed to the institutions.
• Other Applications: Various other application systems are utilized by departments such as Adi Dravidar Welfare, Civil Supplies, Rural Development, Small Industries, Labour & Employment, Rehabilitation and Ex-Servicemen. One of the important efforts has been to identify the bogus ration cards by validating the consolidated data of fair price shops in the district and filtering the cards for verification. The system developed by Tirunelveli district for Ex-Servicemen Office for issuing Identity Card has been implemented in many districts in Tamil Nadu. Support is also given for various other state/national level projects such as Elections, Education Survey, BPL Survey, Census, Agmarknet and Examination Results dissemination.
• NICNET Services: Using the NICNET connectivity, various departments update periodical data. Some of the important web based applications are for drought/flood monitoring system for Revenue department, weekly reporting system of Agriculture department, periodical reports to the Directorates of Health, Civil Supplies, Backward Classes, Statistics etc. Email services are being utilized by all departments. Services are extended using LAN in the Collectorate.
• District Website: A comprehensive website has been developed for district and hosted at http://www.nellai.nic.in. The site has exhaustive information on general details, administration, agriculture, education, irrigation and tourism. Blood donors’ details are disseminated using the website. Status of the public petitions submitted to District Collector can also be viewed.
• Training: Regular training programmes are conducted for using application systems and office tools. The present thrust has been to train Village Panchayat officials to use computers in Panchayats. Technical support is being given for making use of the Video Conferencing.
NIC Tirunelveli District Unit has been providing active support to District Administration in making use of ICT tools. The service of the NIC District Centre has been appreciated by all the heads of departments in the district. The District Collector honoured the DIO and DIA with Commendation Certificates in the year 2003. It has been an incentive to strive further as a team towards good e-Governance.
NIC Tirunelvali District Unit District Informatics Officer S. Deverajan Informatics Associate P Arumuganainar