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http://www.openj-gate.org/include/redirect.asp?JCode=123625&Source=&type=J&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Eegovonline%2Enet%2Farticles%2Farticle%2Ddetails%2Easp%3Farticleid%3D1051%26typ%3DFocus
E-GOVERNANCE A RISING WAVE IN GOA
February-2007
J.J.R. Anand
Technical Director
National Informatics Centre, Goa, India
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Goa is still an 'Aspiring Leader' as most of the initiatives taken by
the Government of Goa so far on the Information Technology front are
still in their nascent stage. It may take a couple of years for the
things to get stabilised and start yielding the desired results. At
the same time efforts are also being made to make Goa an IT
destination
GOA, A TINY STATE in India, is a well-known spot on the world tourism
map. It is famous for its beautiful beaches, pleasant climate and
peace-loving people. Along with the waves of the Arabian Sea, in
recent times the waves of information technology (IT) have started
taking Goa in its stride. Though Goa is a late entrant in the arena of
IT, it is all set to catch up with the situation. As per the
e-Readiness Assessment Report 2004 published by the Department of
Information Technology, Government of India, Goa is given the status
of 'Aspiring Leader'. Undoubtedly, at the current juncture,Goa is
still an 'Aspiring Leader' since most of the initiatives taken by the
Government of Goa so far on the IT front are still in their nascent
stage. It may take a couple of years for the things to get stabilised
and start yielding the desired results. At the same time efforts are
also being made to make Goa an IT destination.
Since beginning much efforts have gone in this direction. The Info
Tech Council, a high-level body headed by Dr. R.A.Mashelkar, Director
General, CSIR, has been constituted to advise the Government on
various IT matters, particularly in the areas relating to applications
of technology in R&D, and development of relevant infrastructure. A
Task force for Good Governance has been constituted under the
Chairmanship of the Minister to lay down the policy framework for
achieving the objectives of Good Governance, including e-Governance.
The Task force is responsible, inter alia, for ensuring fl ow of
sufficient funds for e-Governance activities. Goa IT Policy was
announced in 2005. A High Level Monitoring Committee has been
constituted which is responsible for review and monitoring of the
measures taken by the Government for the implementation of the IT
Policy. Rajiv Gandhi IT habitat, IT Park and IT Retreat are being
established to house IT/ITES companies. Govt. of Goa has declared them
as SEZ (Special Economic Zones), which would further create conducive
atmosphere for rapid growth of IT/ITES industry. Besides, more
incentives for investment in the IT sector have also been announced
Cyberarge scheme was launched to provide computer systems to all the
11th standard students to develop their IT skills and also to make
their family e-Literate. A training programme was launched to ensure
that in the next five years every graduate becomes computer savvy.
Though Goa is a late entrant in the arena of IT, it is all set to
catch up with the situation. As per the e-Readiness Assessment Report
2004 published by the Department of Information Technology, Government
of India, Goa is given the status of 'Aspiring Leader'
E- GOVERNANCE SCENARIO
The Government of Goa has set two key strategic goals– Convenience and
Integration. Regarding convenience, the Government aims to provide
services anytime, anyhow and anywhere.It also aims at providing
services that are integrated, customer-centric through whole-of
government approach. As far as Goa is concerned, the fi rst stage of
e-Governance, i.e. dissemination of department specifi c information,
started way back in 1989 when NIC Goa was set up in the State. A few
departments have gone in for computerisation of some of their
functional areas with the help of NIC Goa. The computerisation during
this period mainly focused on creation of databases for dissemination
of information with accuracy and speed. Also, one could see some
remarkable improvements in the computerised process over the manual
process of functions. Today, Goa has comfortably positioned itself in
the second stage of e-Governance by offering department specific
services to its citizens (G2C). It has also come out with a couple of
G2G and G2E services.
G2C SERVICES
Land records (Form I & XIV): Goa is the fi rst state in the country to
computerise 100% land records. The land records computerisation
software called DHARANI is being used to issue the ROR (Record of
Rights: Form I & XIV and Form D) instantly across the counter to the
public from all the offices and Mahiti Ghars (Information Kiosks). All
the offi ces are interconnected through a Statewide Network called
GOANET which makes it possible to issue the ROR of any Taluka from any
other Taluka or Mahiti Ghars. Touch screen based kiosks have also been
installed at strategic locations to provide land records information
in multilingual form to the people.
Municipal councils
The Municipal Administration Software implemented in all the 13
municipal councils in Goa facilitates online registration of births
and deaths, issuance of births and deaths certifi cates across the
counter, easy and faster collection of house tax, lease rent, trade
licence fee and renewal of licences. It also helps in timely
generation of tax bills, demand and warrant notices and in effi cient
maintenance of taxpayer wise accounts. Since all the transactions are
carried out online at any given time up-to-date status are available
on various parameters.
Village panchayats
INFOGRAM software provides all government services to citizens at
grassroots level in a faster and an effi cient manner. INFOGRAM
provides various services like registration of births and deaths,
house tax and light tax collection, lease rent collection,
construction licences, and trade licences. All transactions are
carried out online and hence up-to-date status is available on various
parameters. INFOGRAM also provides services like issuance of Form I &
XIV, issuance of various certifi cates like residence certifi cate,
income certificate, character certifi cate, caste certifi cate etc.,
and issuance of NOC for water and electricity connection. Through
INFOGRAM citizens can also get information on citizen charters of all
Government departments, BPL schemes etc. So far INFOGRAM has been
implemented in 22 village panchayats and is being rolled out in the
remaining 167 village panchayats.
RTO
The Government of Goa has computerised the transport department.This
has enabled the department to deliver its citizen oriented services in
an effi cient manner. People in Goa are no longer required to wait in
long queues or go through the middlemen to get their work done by the
transport department. With the new system in place, learner's licence
can be obtained from the Mahithi Ghars after fulfi lling all the
requirements. As a novel idea, the new vehicles can be registered by
the dealers at their outlet itself. Smart card based driving licences
are also being issued in order to make the system perfect. Efforts are
on to make available the details of all the vehicles registered in Goa
on web. This would help in quickly identifying the vehicles involved
in crimes.
Courts
After the computerisation of the Panaji Bench of Bombay High Court and
the district courts, the advocates and litigants are largely benefi
ted by the information services provided by these courts. A Touch
Screen Information Kiosk has been set up in the Panaji Bench of Bombay
High Court to provide information to the public on fi nal orders,
farad orders, judgements, acts, rules and regulations, court fees
etc., The Touch Screen Kiosk software provides the user a very
user-friendly query feature so that the user can query on various
parameters like case number, party name, advocate, order date etc.
Case related information are also available on the website.
Preparations are on to computerise all the lower level (Block level)
courts.
Though Goa is a late entrant in the arena of IT, it is all set to
catch up with the situation. As per the e-Readiness Assessment Report
2004 published by the Department of Information Technology, Government
of India, Goa is given the status of 'Aspiring Leader'
Right to Information
The Right to Information Act 2005 is slowly getting popularised in
Goa, and to meet the information requirements of the people the
Government of Goa has launched a citizen portal for disseminating
information under RTI Act 2005. The required information is
electronically maintained in a central system and being updated from
time to time by the Government departments.
G2G services
Computerisation of budget and accounts: The Government of Goa has
taken keen interest in computerising the Finance Department and
Directorate of Accounts (DOA) to provide G2G services with respect to
budget and settlement of accounts. Budget Information System has been
implemented in the Finance Department of Goa Secretariat. By capturing
the details such as Expenditure estimates for the next year received
from various departments and Actual expenditure,Revised estimates,
Recovery, Receipt, Budget Account Head Information and the
Supplementary budget requirement for the current year received from
the DOA, budget for a financial year is prepared and electronically
made available to the DOA. The DOA is the budget controlling authority
for the Government of Goa. DOA has one Head offi ce and one Branch
offi ce. There are two District Treasuries and 9 Sub Treasuries.
Software Systems have been implemented in DOA and Treasuries for bill
processing, treasury accounting, works audit and compilation of
accounts. There are several advantages of computerisation of DOA.
Bills are cleared faster. Cheques are issued faster. Reconciliation of
cheques is also done effectively. Availability of up-to-date Budget
Control Register fi gures. Compilation of various accounts is done
faster and all the accounts are closed in time. As the DOA and the
District/Sub-Treasuries are interconnected it is possible to provide
the receipts and payment fi gures on daily basis to the Finance
Department.
G2E SERVICES
General Provident Fund
There are about 40,000 GPF subscribers in the State of Goa. GPF System
has been designed to maintain their accountsup-to-date, which
includes monthly subscriptions, advances, refunds, withdrawals,
interest calculation and fi nal payment. The GPF System has also the
features to generate GPF slips, employee wise summary statement,
statement of interest, DDO wise GPF subscription schemes, various
reports and
Employee advances
Advances Management System is deployed to help the staff at the Loans
and Advances section of DOA to effi ciently process the requests from
the employees of the Government of Goa for various types of advances
like HBA, MCA, Fan, Cycle etc., and to maintain up-to-date records.
Advances Management System has the provision to check for availability
of funds, pass the bills for advances, maintain up-to-date employee
wise account, close accounts monthly and annually, calculate interest,
issue No Dues certifi cate and to generate various reports and
registers.
INITIATIVES TOWARDS INTEGRATED SERVICES
GOANET to Goa Broadband Network
No doubt, GOANET at present is acting as a backbone in providing
various G2C services and G2B services. GOANET is a combination of 64
Kbps and 2 Mbps leased line circuit network connecting all the Taluka
headquarters and a few Government offi ces. However, to integrate
services of various Government departments and to take more services
to doorsteps of the citizens it is necessary to have a large network
with very high bandwidth. Government of Goa is all set to establish a
Goa Broadband Network which is a opticfiber network under BOO
(Build-Own-Operate) model. This network is expected to provide a
bandwidth of 10 Gbps to the State, District and Taluka headquarters, 1
Gbps to village panchayats and 2 to 100 Mbps to each household
depending on the need and demand. All the Government, semi-government
organisations and corporations would be connected through 1 Gbps
connectivity.
Mahithi Ghars and Citizen Service Centres
Government of Goa is planning to set up more Mahithi Ghars and around
200 Citizen Service Centres in the State under BOO model to provide
various government services under one roof. Depending on the
requirements the operator may provide some value added services to the
citizens. In order to execute its e-Governance plan systematically,
PWC and NISG have been appointed as consultants to the government. PWC
has prepared the e-Governance roadmap and has identifi ed around 600
citizen and business oriented services for implementation. NISG has
been advising the Government on Goa Broadband Network. Simultaneously
with other activities, the Government departments, which have not been
computerised so far, are going in for total computerisation.
Applications are being developed for 32 departments. Online services
can commence once the database is built through backend computing.
State Data Centre
A State Data Centre along with suitable Disaster Recovery (DR) Site is
being planned to support the implementation of various e-Governance
projects. It has been proposed to utilise NIC Data Centre at Hyderabad
as DR Site.
State Portal
It is very much essential to have a single offi cial portal for the
entire State of Goa to act as a single contact point for the services
offered by the State of Goa. Through this portal, it is planned to
offer, all informative, interactive, transactional and collaborative
services to the citizen and business.
CONCLUSION
No doubt, efforts are being made to make Goa an 'IT Destination' and
'e-Governance Leader'.However, this requires a strong political will
and commitment irrespective of the political party that is in power.
Continuity in the IT projects is very important for their success.
They should not be scuttled for political reasons leading to wastage
of taxpayers' money. Bureaucrats/Government offi cials/Decision makers
need to be proactive with altogether a different mindset suitable for
this exercise. High priority and importance should be given to IT
Projects. Process re-engineering in the functional areas and use of
e-Governance standards will help to provide effective and scalable IT
solutions. Citizens, instead of remaining as mute spectators, should
legitimately demand for high quality and timely services in all fronts
from the Government.
--
Frederick Noronha Journalist http://fn.goa-india.org
E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED]
P: +91-832-2409490 M: +91-9970157402
Yahoo: fredericknoronha Skype: fredericknoronha GTalk: fredericknoronha
Saligao 403511 Goa India http://www.linkedin.com/in/fredericknoronha
