The revolution in information and communication technologies is changing the way the government interacts with the citizen these days. The national e-governance programme was conceived with a vision to bring all the government services closer to the citizen through common service delivery outlets at affordable cost. The shift from a department-centric mode of working to a citizen-centric way of working entails a transformational change in whole aspects from business process re-engineering to change management, from transforming process to transforming the mindset of people. E-district is a tailor-made programme conceptualized for enhancing the efficiency of various departments at district level for minimizing effort and time so as to provide prompt and effective services to the citizen. A Mission Mode Project under NeGP, e-district aims at electronic delivery of high volume citizen- centric services at district and sub-district level. The ground rule of such a shift-over is largescale digitization of records pertaining to departments, district-level offices and inter-departmental linkage. Out of the 640 districts in the country, 41 districts were taken up in the initial phase to implement the programme. In Kerala, Kannur and Palakkad districts were chosen to be the pilot e-districts. The basic IT infrastructure, connectivity, capacity building, site preparation, data digitization and technical support were provided at district and sub-district levels. KSITM is the State designated agency to implement the project at state level, whereas district e-governance committee, led by the District Collector is the core of the implementation structure at district level. The citizen-centric approach of the government would always care for the empowerment of its citizen. To enable electronic delivery of services, the state is required to issue necessary government orders and notification. Necessary legal and statutory changes also have to be made by the state government to enable e-services and to stop the manual services. The services through e-district include certificates of income, domicile, caste etc (Revenue) issue of ration cards (Public Distribution System), online filing of receipt of information relating to Right to Information Act, linking with registration-land records and Motor Vehicles Department etc. To begin with, e-district platform covers 23 certificates services from Revenue Department. As many as 3,00,000-odd certificates issued in the pilot districts within a year of inception in e-district platform through Akshaya centres speak volumes for pubic acceptance of such a programme in the minds of the common people. Nativity, income, community and possession certificates were of high demand among the lot. Unnecessary access to the government offices, time delay in obtaining certificates, office hour constraints etc would be no more. Citizens have the liberty to file in the application online and can attend their work without compromising on their contractual obligations. Officers on the other hand find their job easy. The effectiveness at multiple levels would certainly pave the way to an empowered society. The public will have to register their details with all relevant documents in Akshaya centres. After registration, Akshaya entrepreneur will apply for the relevant certificate from village office, using the login ID provided by KSITM. The village officer, after examining the relevance of the information in application, approves it using his digital signature and passes it electronically to the Akshaya centre. The public in due course can access the certificate with ease from Akshaya centres. The registration number obtained while giving personal information in Akshaya centre can be further used to apply for any other available certificates from revenue department of the citizen’s choice. The more rapid the lifestyle of people changes, the more they are concerned about the ease of use of time. The electronic delivery of citizen services without much of a mess would only make the life of the citizen better than in the quandary of those tiresome long-waiting queues.(The writer is coordinator, Akshaya Project of Kerala State IT Mission- Kannur District, Kerala. Email ID: [email protected]. The views expressed in the article are the author’s own).
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