Accelerating the #DigitalIndia Vision through Technology and e-Governance

Reaching The..Unreached

Randhawa, a paddy farmer at the hinterland of Surguja district in Madhya Pradesh, had been making rounds at local Patwari and district collector's office to claim his ancestral piece of land. In spite of having owned this land by the generations, every year, a new incumbent rise as a threat to him. Being the simple, uneducated farmer at the sleepy village of Rampur, MP, Randhawa could do little to save his land, if not for eGovernance, his land would have become a thing of history. eGovernance and technology had come to rescue for poor Randhawa. Using e-governance, he could get his land registered in no time and also got the officially stamped papers, including his ownership recorded in a government database forever.

e-Governance came as a ray of hope in 60-year-old poor Kamla's life as well. Kamla lost her husband in an unfortunate action and with the help of e-governance, she could not just obtain a death certificate for her husband but also could claim for her widow's pension. Not just that, e-governance has also provided employment to Kamla's younger son Chirag wherein he helps other poor villagers get their mean achieved using e-governance and the digital revolution.

Using Technology to bridge digital Gap

For quite a long time, developing countries have carried the burden of colonization and slavery, which resulted in the lack of confidence in developing economies and also beliefs that they are not at par with rest of world. This is nothing but "lack of access". This "Lack of Access" has curtailed people's ability to develop and compete. To enjoy any economic and social benefit, "access to resources like "Education", "health" and employment has become critical.

With the advent of technology, the Internet has born. And if you want to bring more economic and social benefit, the Internet, is one key solution and read as "Boon" to help achieve the same. Rural Information and Communication technologies i.e. ICT can be used as an effective tool to bridge the digital divide and help the developing nation like India to drive the digital revolution.

The total rural population of the developing world is about 3billion [est], with their average per capita income being no more than $200 per annum, India has 750 million rural people located in around 6,00,000 villages. So any plan or program that is implemented in 100, 1000 or 10,000 villages is still very minuscule with barely any contribution to the entire rural economy. It may be good for pilot or experimental purposes, but if we want to drive real growth and empowerment, "Scale-ability" is a key that we must look at. And to harness Scale-ability, Connectivity is vital.

With new modes of terrestrial wireless and satellite solution, the connectivity has been largely evaluated and provided, even at economical cost. Important is the content and the intent. DO not worry, we will not talk about the technology and cost of deploying technology here. Well, Intel has already taken a beautiful responsibility on that, making the dream of "Digital India" viable and possible via its "Digital Skill for India" and "Innovate for India" initiatives. What shall we talk here is about e-governance.

What is e-governance and how it can accelerate the growth of Digital India through technology
Technology is a great enabler and Internet is a boon. Gone are the days when technology was restricted to top cities. Today, in order to be more successful and widely reached, technology is penetrating to the larger part of India, largely through Internet.

eGovernance is one important tool and helps India in-

Good Governance

• Bringing more transparency and harnessing a democratic society
• People's participation, ensuring that governance reaches every part of India and not just restricted to the center.

Public Services and Utility

• Creating citizen access to greater information
• Convenient and faster services to citizens and businesses via "Governance to business" and "Governance to citizens"
• Efficient cost effective, accessible and highly responsive governance
• Government accountability for public delivery

Better Management

• Manage voluminous data for a highly populated and diverse country like India
• Information Services to one and all
• Creating Simplicity in government processes and schemes 
• Bringing efficiency and accountability

One such roaring example is "IRCTC". Today you can book your railway tickets at comfort of your laptop, computer or mobile screens

How innovation will fuel up "Digital India" Revolution
The success of an idea is measured in end results or no of end user case it develops successfully to widen the reach. What I mean that if you want to drive high penetration of a specific initiative, you need to cater the wide requirements than just a niche segment. Like we spoke earlier about how experimenting a project for 100 or 1000 village would still not bring much difference. Similarly, e-Governance needs to have addresses different issues and the governmental requirement to be a successful model. Hence, innovation is a must!

To accelerate the vision of digital India, eGovernance should target healthy innovation at-

G2G : Government to Government
G2C: Government to Citizen
G2B: Government to Business
G2E: Government to Employee



Some innovation and initiatives in this field-
1) Computerization of records likes land records and other important documents like birth/death certificates, pension scheme
2) Healthcare: Information on personal healthcare and details on government support programs like Universal Immunization program, National Health programs, and others
3) Education
4) Agriculture
5) RTI

e-Governance is nothing but the use of Internet as a tool to approach and link directly to the government for all kinds of problems and support. The success of this service largely dependent on technology and local administration like active participation of district collectors, who needs to drive this service. Like in Tamil Nadu, in a place called Thiruvallur, wherein the district collector started a "weekly web darbar " with villagers through which he connects to 50 plus village simultaneously and conducts sessions wherein he answers queries and addresses grievances,

Similarly, if you heard about the story of a handicapped person who sent a complaint to the chief Minister's cell, complaining of unfair termination of service. He need not have to run pillar to post at government units for his grievance. But he got redressal wherein he got his job in less time post his complaint posting.

Such success stories and the good help from technology majors like Intel makes the wonderful concept of e-Governance, not just a drive but a beautiful beginnings and proceedings for a new era to come, new #DigitalIndia to shine through.



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For more info visit- http://www.intel.in/