6. Digital India Pillars
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Pillars of Digital India:
Digital India is an umbrella programme that covers multiple Government Ministries and Departments. It weaves together a large number of ideas and thoughts into a single, comprehensive vision so that each of them can be implemented as part of a larger goal. Each individual element stands on its own, but is also part of the larger picture. Digital India is to be implemented by the entire Government with overall coordination being done by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY).
Digital India aims to provide the much needed thrust to the nine pillars of growth areas, namely Broadband Highways, Universal Access to Mobile Connectivity, Public Internet Access Programme, e-Governance: Reforming Government through Technology, e-Kranti - Electronic Delivery of Services, Information for All, Electronics Manufacturing, IT for Jobs and Early Harvest Programmes. Each of these areas is a complex programme in itself and cuts across multiple Ministries and Departments.
- BROADBAND HIGHWAYS
- UNIVERSAL ACCESS TO MOBILE CONNECTIVITY
- PUBLIC INTERNET ACCESS PROGRAMME
- E-GOVERNANCE – REFORMING GOVERNMENT THROUGH TECHNOLOGY
- EKRANTI - ELECTRONIC DELIVERY OF SERVICES
- INFORMATION FOR ALL
- ELECTRONICS MANUFACTURING-
- IT FOR JOBS
- EARLY HARVEST PROGRAMMES
- BROADBAND HIGHWAYS
This covers three sub components, namely Broadband for All - Rural, Broadband for All - Urban and National Information Infrastructure (NII).
Broadband for All - Rural
2,50,000 village Panchayats would be covered under the National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) by December 2016. Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is the nodal Department for this project.
Broadband for All - Urban
Virtual Network Operators would be leveraged for service delivery and communication infrastructure in new urban developments and buildings would be mandated.
National Information Infrastructure (NII)
NII would integrate the network and cloud infrastructure in the country to provide high speed connectivity and cloud platform to various government departments up to the panchayat level. These infrastructure components include networks such as State Wide Area Network (SWAN), National Knowledge Network (NKN), National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN), Government User Network (GUN) and the MeghRaj Cloud. NII aims at integrating all ICT infrastructure components such as SWANs, NKN, NOFN, GUN and GI Cloud. It will have provision for horizontal connectivity to 100, 50, 20 and 5 government offices/ service outlets at state, district, block and Panchayat levels respectively. DeitY will be the nodal Department for this project.
2. UNIVERSAL ACCESS TO MOBILE CONNECTIVITY
This initiative focuses on network penetration and filling the gaps in connectivity in the country.
There are around 55,619 villages in the country that do not have mobile coverage. As part of the comprehensive development plan for North East, providing mobile coverage to uncovered villages has been initiated. Mobile coverage to remaining uncovered villages would be provided in a phased manner.
The Department of Telecommunications will be the nodal department and project cost will be around `16,000 Cr during 2014-18.
3. PUBLIC INTERNET ACCESS PROGRAMME
The two sub components of Public Internet Access Programme are Common Services Centres (CSCs) and Post Offices as multi-service centres.
Common Services Centres (CSCs)
CSCs would be strengthened and its number would be increased to 250,000 i.e. one CSC in each Gram Panchayat. CSCs would be made viable and multi-functional end-points for delivery of government and business services. DeitY would be the nodal department to implement the scheme.
Post Offices as multi-service centres
A total of 150,000 Post Offices are proposed to be converted into multi service centres. Department of Posts would be the nodal department to implement this scheme
4. E-GOVERNANCE – REFORMING GOVERNMENT THROUGH TECHNOLOGY
Government Process Re-engineering using IT to simplify and make the government processes more efficient is critical for transformation to make the delivery of government services more effective across various government domains and therefore needs to be implemented by all Ministries/ Departments.
The guiding principles for reforming Government through technology are:
- Form simplification and field reduction – Forms should be made simple and user friendly and only minimum and necessary information should be collected.
- Online applications and tracking - Online applications and tracking of their status should be provided.
- Online repositories - Use of online repositories e.g. for certificates, educational degrees, identity documents, etc. should be mandated so that citizens are not required to submit these documents in physical form.
- Integration of services and platforms – Integration of services and platforms e.g. Aadhaar platform of Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI), payment gateway, Mobile Seva platform, sharing of data through open Application Programming Interfaces (API) and middleware such as National and State Service Delivery Gateways (NSDG/SSDG) should be mandated to facilitate integrated and interoperable service delivery to citizens and businesses.
All databases and information should be in electronic form and not manual. The workflow inside government departments and agencies should be automated to enable efficient government processes and also to allow visibility of these processes to citizens. IT should be used to automate, respond and analyze data to identify and resolve persistent problems. These would be largely process improvements
Background
Over the years, sustained efforts have been made at multiple levels to improve the delivery of public services and simplify the process of accessing them. In this regard, severale-governance initiatives have been undertaken by various State Governments and Central Ministries to usher in an era of e-Government. e-Governance in India has steadily evolved from computerization of Government Departments to initiatives that encapsulate the finer points of Governance, such as citizen centricity, service orientation and transparency.
The National e-Governance Plan (NeGP)
The National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) was conceptualized tofocus on e-Governance initiatives at the national level with an aim to "Make all Government services accessible to the common man in his locality, through common service delivery outlets,and ensure efficiency, transparency, and reliability of such services at affordable costs to realise the basic needs of the common man". The strategy adopted was centralized planning and decentralized planning. The Government initially approved the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), comprising of 27 Mission Mode Projects (MMPs) and 8 components, on May 18, 2006. 4 more mission mode projects namely ‘Education’, ‘Health’, ‘Posts’ and ‘Public Distribution System’ were added to NeGP portfolio in 2011. As part of NeGP, core ICT infrastructure has been created by MeitY. This includes State Data Centers, State Wide Area Network, State Service Delivery Gateways, Mobile Seva and eGov AppStore. More than 1.2 lakh Common Service Centers were made operational as service delivery outlets across all the States/UTs. With the learnings from the experience of implementation of NeGP over the last 7 yearsand an analysis of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats of NeGP revealed several issues mainly in terms of lack of proper dose of Government Process Reengineering in Government Schemes / projects / applications / databases, lack of integration & interoperability amongst Government Applications & databases, limited scope of existing Mission Mode Projects, lack of leveraging emerging technologies like Mobile and Cloud and lack of Inclusive Mission Mode Projects like Women & Child Development MMP, Social Justice & Empowerment MMP etc. e-Kranti has been designed to address the aforesaid challenges.
5. EKRANTI - ELECTRONIC DELIVERY OF SERVICES
e-Kranti (Transforminge-GovernanceforTransforming Governance)
Considering the critical need for transforming e-Governance and promote mobile Governance and Good Governance in the country, the approach and key components of e-Kranti have been approved by the Union Cabinet on 25.03.2015 with the vision of “Transforming e-Governance for Transforming Governance”.
The key principles of e-Kranti are as follows:
1. Transformation and not Translation - All project proposals in e-Kranti must involve substantial transformation in the quality, quantity and manner of delivery of services and significant enhancement in productivity and competitiveness.
2. Integrated Services and not Individual Services - A common middleware and integration of the back end processes and processing systems is required to facilitate integrated service delivery to citizens.
3. Government Process Reengineering (GPR) to be mandatory in every MMP - To mandate GPR as the essential first step in all new MMPs without which a project may not be sanctioned. The degree of GPR should be assessed and enhanced for the existing MMPs.
4. ICT Infrastructure on Demand – Government departments should be provided with ICT infrastructure, such as connectivity, cloud and mobile platform on demand. In this regard, National Information Infrastructure (NII), which is at an advanced stage of project formulation, would be fast-tracked by DeitY.
5. Cloud by Default – The flexibility, agility and cost effectiveness offered by cloud technologies would be fully leveraged while designing and hosting applications. Government Cloud shall be the default cloud for Government Departments. All sensitive information of Government Departments shall be stored in a Government Cloud only. Any Government Department may use a private cloud only after obtaining permission from Department of Electronics and Information Technology which shall do so after assessing the security and privacy aspects of the proposed cloud.
6. Mobile First - All applications are designed/ redesigned to enable delivery of services through mobile.
7. Fast Tracking Approvals – To establish a fast-track approval mechanism for MMPs, once the Detailed Project Report (DPR) of a project is approved by the Competent Authority, Empowered Committees may be constituted with delegated powers to take all subsequent decisions.
8. Mandating Standards and Protocols – Use of e-Governance standards and protocols as notified by DeitY be mandated in all e-governance projects.
9. Language Localization - It is imperative that all information and services in e-Governance projects are available in Indian languages as well.
10. National GIS (Geo-Spatial Information System) - NGIS to be leveraged as a platform and as a service in e-Governance projects.
11. Security and Electronic Data Preservation - All online applications and e-services to adhere to prescribed security measures including cyber security. The National Cyber Security Policy 2013 notified by DeitY must be followed.
All new and on-going eGovernance projects as well as the existing projects, which are being revamped, should now follow the key principles of e-Kranti.
6. INFORMATION FOR ALL
Open Data platform (http://data.gov.in)
Open Data platform facilitates proactive release of datasets in an open format by the ministries/departments for use, reuse and redistribution. Online hosting of information & documents would facilitate open and easy access to information for citizens.
Government shall pro-actively engage through social media
Government shall pro-actively engage through social media and web based platforms to inform and interact with citizens. MyGov.in, a platform for citizen engagement in governance, has been launched by the Hon’ble Prime Minister on 26th July, 2014, as a medium to exchange ideas/ suggestions with Government. It will facilitate 2-way communication between citizens and Government to bring in good governance.
Online messaging
Online messaging to citizens on special occasions/programs would be facilitated through emails and SMS.
Open Data platform, Social Media Engagement and Online Messaging
Open Data platform, Social Media Engagement and Online Messaging would largely utilise existing infrastructure and would need limited additional resources.
7. ELECTRONICS MANUFACTURING
This pillar focuses on promoting electronics manufacturing in the country with the target of NET ZERO Imports by 2020 as a striking demonstration of intent. This ambitious goal requires coordinated action on many fronts, such as:
- Taxation, incentives
- Economies of scale, eliminating cost disadvantages
- Focus areas – Big Ticket Items
- FABS, Fab-less design, Set top boxes, VSATs, Mobiles, Consumer & Medical Electronics, Smart Energy meters, Smart cards, micro-ATMs
- Incubators, clusters
- Skill development, Enhancing PhDs
- Government procurement
- Safety Standards – Compulsory registration, Support for Labs and MSMEs
- National Award, Marketing, Brand Building
- National Centres – Flexible Electronics, Security Forces
- R & D in electronics
- 8. IT FOR JOBS
This pillar focuses on providing training to the youth in the skills required for availing employment opportunities in the IT/ITES sector. There are eight components with specific scope of activities under this pillar:
- IT Trainings to people in smaller towns and villages
- The target of this component is to train one crore students from smaller towns & villages for IT sector jobs over 5 years. DeitY is the nodal department for this scheme.
- IT/ITES in Northeastern States
- This component focuses on setting up BPOs in every north-eastern state to facilitate ICT enabled growth in these states. DeitY is the nodal department for this scheme.
- Training Service Delivery Agents
- The focus is on training three lakh service delivery agents as part of skill development to run viable businesses delivering IT services. DeitY is the nodal department for this scheme.
- Training Rural Workforce on Telecom and Telecom related services
- This component focuses on training of five lakh rural workforce the Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) to cater to their own needs. Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is the nodal department for this scheme.
North East BPO Promotion Scheme (NEBPS)
The Indian BPO industry has witnessed significant growth over the past years and India has gradually emerged as one of the preferred BPO destinations globally. Several factors including operational cost effectiveness, availability of skilled manpower and ever-increasing demand for employment opportunities have increasingly contributed to the growth of BPO industry in the country. However, the BPO industry has largely been concentrated in and around large (Tier-I) cities where skilled manpower drawn from various parts of the country including NE Region seek employment.
In large (Tier-I) cities, the recurring manpower cost to the company is considered to be higher particularly keeping in view the relatively higher cost of residential accommodation and larger travelling distance for employees. Thus, it would be prudent for a BPO Company to migrate to smaller (Tier-II/III) cities including those in North Eastern Region, as it would result in significantly reduced manpower related expenses and thus making its operations far more profitable. It is understood that key concerns for setting up of BPO operations in the N.E. Region are related to various issues including reliable internet connectivity and power supply.