Inter-Ministerial group on e-governance soon: Sam Pitroda

Bangalore, May 8: A high-level Inter-Ministerial Group, headed by the Prime Minister, will soon be in place to monitor the implementation of the recommendations of the National Knowledge Commission on e-governance, Commission Chairman Sam Pitroda said today.

Briefing newspersons after a three-day sitting of the Commission on e-governance issues, he said the recommendations of the Commission were being discussed at various levels at the Centre and the Inter-Ministerial Group would be formed soon.

Presenting the recommendations on e-governance, Mr Pitroda said there was a need for creating an appropriate Central organisation with structures that could operate on mission mode with full autonomy and accountability.

''We need to re-engineer our processes first, to change our basic governance pattern for simplicity, transparency, productivity and efficiency,'' he said, adding that common standards should be developed so that common platform/infrastructure could be deployed for e-governance so that it could be made citizen-centric.

Admitting that there would be some initial resistance like the one faced during the initial phase of telecom revolution in the country, Mr Pitroda said the gains made, however, would enable implementation of a national e-governance programme within the next three to five years.

He said ten to 20 important services that make a critical difference should be offered through web-based services.

The recommendations were based on a report on e-governance, prepared by a spcial group of the Commission, headed by Infosys CEO Nandan M Nilekani.

The Commisssion recommended focusing on organisational issues relating to re-engineering Government processes with strong committed leadership, autonomy, flexibility, clarity of purpose, pre-defined deliverables and measurable milestones.

Lamenting that various State Governments were doing it their own way to selectively computerise their processes and provide e-governance, the Commission rued that many of the programmes were vendor-driven and not scalable. It stressed the need for development and enforcement of citizen/business entitlement standards uniformly for all States and Central ministries and functions spanning from voting, taxes, certificates, financial products, law enforcement and welfare of individuals, properties of land, institutions and businesses.

These standards should not be hardware-centric and vendor-dependent, but should enable easy participation by any State, panchayat institution, business, Non-Government Organisation or citizen, the Commission said, adding that these standards, templates and data formats must be designed carefully by expert teams drawn from Government, IT companies, academia and R and D institutions.

Because of the enormous size and scope of e-governance effort in India and the availability of globally recognised software talent of Indians, the Commission recommended implementation of open source software and open standards. ''This will allow us to have a cost-effective solution and help develop open software products and standards,'' it said, adding that it would also help improve scaling up as well as minimise delays caused by repeat tendering.

The Commission called for the appointment of a Chief Information Technology Officer for each State and major Central Government departments with relevant expertise and skills in the domain subject and IT usage. The posts must be filled up on open recruitment and draw the best and brightest from India's technologically qualified talent and the officers should be paid market salary.

The Commission also recommended investment of one to two per cent of the budget for various national programmes in establishing new processes and associated e-governance infrastructure to improve delivery and reduce leakages. Each of the programmes such as Bharat Nirmal, Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and urban development initiatives should begin with well engineered e-governance implementation and web interface to ensure speedy delivery, productivity and efficiency.

Mr Pitroda said the Central organisation recommended for operating on a mission mode to implement various e-governance initiatives should draw members from the IT industry and Government to redesign processes and procedures. It should represent multiplicity of stakeholders and diversify in domain expertise and drive the national e-governance plan with facilitation from the Communication and Information Technology Ministry.

The task of the organisation should include administrative reforms related to process re-engineering, providing and maintaining common national ICT infrastructure for e-governance, providing leadership and framework for implementation with immediate focus on selected mission mode projects and providing neutral consulting framework and standards for e-governance with the help of Chief Information Technology Officers.

Mr Pitroda said the e-governance efforts were now primarily based on computersing age-old prcessses left behind by the British Raj and compounded by plethora of new layers and silos by the Indian bureaucracy, each working within departmental boundaries and pet priorities.

He said it was time for the country to leave behind the British Raj and re-engineer and modernise Government processes to build a new India of the 21st century. To achieve this, the Government processes need to be redesigned, keeping the citizen at the centre.

This would drastically reduce the number and duration of successive steps required to obtain services. It would also provide traceable records, enable enforcement of individual performance, accountability, efficiency, productivity as well as transparency of policies and processes.

UNI