By: Mudasir Ali
E-Governance has made public offices and institutions quite dynamic and to some extent narrowed down gaps and increased accessibility for everyone and therefore strongly built a close relation with high smartness and efficiency in work. e-Governance, stands for ‘electronic governance’ which implies the use of applications of Information and Communication Technology to government functioning. According to World Bank, e- Governance refers to the use by government agencies of information technologies (such as Wide Area Networks, the internet and mobile computing) which are aimed at developing a substantial bond with citizens, businesses and other arms of government.
Working environment in public institutions has got much better since features of e-governnence. This has enormously reduced administrative challenges and thereby opened up new ways for self-resiliency. Citizens are now familiar with e-Governance, by using ICT tools for completing their tasks (work at home) and it has shaped citizens by transforming them into smart citizens. It is worth to note that public institutions today expeditiously work for catering clients on fast service basis.
The ICT is now a powerful communication tool which has taken new heights on the global level to bring considerable changes in integrating many emerging economies for setting their ties with each other on multiple levels for research and development. India has embarked on a new journey in revolutionizing e- Governance for better planning and coordination between the different levels of governance. Under e-Governance, Ministry of Electronics & IT, the Common services centres have been operatioalised in rural areas whereby people had suffered many problems due to lack of online services. Their ease of living is gradually improving on and they will not remain far from the common opportunities.
Over the couple of years, e-Governance in India has widely improved institutions in terms of reliability, efficiency, privacy and above all transparency. Common citizens, could not have ever thought of it in the past that we would come to see the wonders of e-Governance by having its vast connectivity. Hence, they make every good effort to come up with better and reliable tools for the growth of digital India.
Citizens have become tech-savvy by switching over to use of online applications in their smart phones.It has lessened the burden of applicants, especially poor citizens, who were lagging behind in availing benefits of various schemes. One of the exemplary works by e-Governance isthat it propels vigorously business communities in trading and to create a more transparent environment for them. From top to bottom, it has systematically coordinated all the institutions to reinforce their mechanism for displaying the functional spirit in data management.
Functioning of various institutions is administratively overlooked by the top officials. Every institution is working under strict rules and regulations and there is no chance of any infringement in database which is exclusively maintained. There seems a positive growth in public institutions in terms of services delivery, data collection, reliability, privacy, and transparency that perfectly achieves accountability towards citizens.
People in India now feel very much comfortable by paying online e-bills of any kind instead of making frequent visits in departments and offices. Portals made available on websites for applying in different government schemes has helped a lot of applicants andstudents also feel relaxed for applying for national scholarships and direct disbursement of cash for eligible beneficiaries into their bank accounts which are registered under government schemes. By far, it has administratively grown up institutions with great care. Employees in public institutions are now well equipped with ICT tools and they have learnt many modules of it for working on online mode.
Moreover, the ICT has leveraged citizen’s empowerment access to information and concerns relating to different services. This has largely benefited to the institutions as well as citizens. Corruption and red tapism have no entry anywhere in public institutions as everything is under proper surveillance. It has also brought down cost reductions of papers and paved the way for smooth processing.
Government of India has taken many initiatives pertaining to e-Governance to overcome various administrative challenges in order to serve the citizens better under it. e-Governance, therefore is basically a move towards smart Governance implying simple, moral, accountable, responsive and transparent governance. There are four types of interactions in e-Governance, viz, Government to Citizens (G2C), Government to Business, (G2B), Government to Government, (G2G), and government to employees, (G2E).
The writer is a teacher. ahangermudasir911@gmail.com
