Centre should spend more on e-governance: Satpathy

Chandigarh, July 23 (UNI) The Central Government has been spending merely 0.7 per cent of the GDP on IT which is miniscule, Economic Advisor to the Ministry of Communication and IT B N Satpathy said today.

In order to reach out to the people at the grassroots and make IT a true revolution, the investment must be increased, Mr Satpathy said.

IT is an imperative tool and a factor of production which can make any organisation much more effective and efficient, he said at the post lunch session of e-Revolution 2006 here.

National Institute for Smart Governance CEO J Satyanarayana said that e-governance today is not only about governance but using Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to address development issue.

ICT is useful in bringing transparency, elimination of corruption, security, privacy, and non-discrimination in the society, he said.

Dr Rajendra Gupta, Lead Solution Architect (Govt), IBM India, said e-governance without ethics is not possible. On-demand government is the next step of the IT revolution which would help citizen access the required service as and when they need it.

Chairing the session on shared services, KMG CEO Rahul Gupta said that standardisation in processes has already been established and it is time that other states also replicate instead of reinventing the wheel.

Mr Rohit Anand, senior consultant with PWC said that government is moving towards citizen-centric services which require private partnership as well as partnering with other organisations for shared services in which IT plays a crucial role.

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