E-Governance in India - Center and State Integrated MMPs

We have seen the Center and State level Mission Mode Projects (MMPs) taken up by Government of India under National e-Governance Plan (NeGP).There are certain governance responsibilities, which are to be jointly undertaken by both center and state governments in India. The following are key MMPs considered from IT perspective to increase the efficiency in governance (source: http://mit.gov.in).

I wonder how many people know about how IT is being applied for e-governance in India ! After all these are certain good things being done by (any) government in the last decade or so.

Common Service Centre (CSC) http://www.csc-india.org/	CSCs were conceptualized as the front end service delivery outlets enabling smooth and transparent governance even at the village level. Under the scheme, over one lakh internet enabled kiosks are being set up in the rural areas spread across more than 600,000 villages. I used a CSC utility payments. I heard about entrepreneurs in tier-3 cities taking up the setup of such CSCs in an incentive-based model.
e-Courts	The objective of e-courts is to develop, deliver, install and implement automated decision making and decision support system in courts all over the country. Case Filing, Scrutiny, Registration, Case Allocation, Court Proceedings, Details entry of a Case, Case Disposal & restoration, Transfer of Case, Certified copies of orders and judgments, Case status, Calculation of court fees, Cause lists, Institution Registers, and Court Diaries, Monitoring of pendency in the courts. It seems there are 3 crore pending cases in courts in India. Can the government not increase the number of courts and court employees? Will the IT-enablement alone solve the problems?
EDI/e-Trade - http://etrade.gov.in/	Conceptualized to facilitate effective and efficient mode of transacting business in the area of foreign trade. The project is being pursued in trade regulatory and facilitating agencies like Customs, Ports, Airports, Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), Banks, respective Container Corporation of India (CONCOR), export promotion organizations etc. Never heard about any issues at the border with respect to trade or customs (except for bollywood stars not declaring their valuables appropriately). Guess this MMP should have been implemented on very much effective in operation.
India Portal - http://india.gov.in/	There are over 5000 websites on the internet of various Indian government entities that include Ministries, Departments, States/Union Territories, district administration, organizations. The National Portal of India provides a single window unified interface for all these websites and acts as a logical front end to the e-governance initiatives under various central/state/UT government schemes and programs. Does the government really need so many websites?
National e-Governance Service Delivery Gateway (NSDG) - https://nsdg.gov.in	Different departments in the Centre, States and Local Government cooperate, collaborate and integrate information across the various levels, domains and geographies through NSDG. Does this mean we won't hear ministers say - "The file has not come to my table yet. I have not seen the file"?
e-Biz - http://dipp.nic.in	To transform the business environment in the country by providing efficient, convenient, transparent, and integrated electronic services to investors, industries and business throughout the business life cycle. After moving from License-Raj to Liberalization (1991 onwards), we have seen tremendous growth in business and economy in India. The businesses does not really seem to have much of problems with respect to approvals, extensions and funds.
e-Procurement	The e-Procurement MMP has been designed to take into account Government procurement of goods, works as well as services. It covers all aspects of procurement right from intent of tender to tender preparation, bidding, bid evaluation and award of contract. Could the government not use the applications from this MMP for CWG Games held in Delhi last year?

Product Reviews in India

Are you buying a home appliance? Have you moved into a new locality and want to know reviews of schools and hospitals in that area? You are a book worm and need to decide whether to buy a book? Are you looking to buy insurance from a specific company? 

One can get answers for these questions at http://mouthshut.com. It provides a platform for the customers to review about products and businesses in India.

When I need to make a buying decision, I can go to this site and look at reviews from other buyers of same or similar products. I can even create my trusted set of advisors and get their view before buying an item. I never tried this option though. The categories of items seems to be pretty exhaustive and the navigation is a little cumbersome. The search would be handy if we know exactly what we are looking for. Too many advertisements  are interspersing with the actual content, which is quite annoying. You can  post a blog entry, write your own review, upload your photographs and even create a poll.

In olden days, how many people could we ask before buying an item? But then, the number of products available for purchase were only in proximity, the options were few and the needs were limited. Word-of-mouth, which was applicable back then, is amplified many times by mouthshut.com.

Did you find any other such sites with so many reviews?

E-Governance in India - State-level MMPs

India is one of the largest democracies in the world and follows federal system of governance which divides the responsibilities of governance between Centre and States. While we have seen centre-level Mission Mode Projects (MMP) initiated by Government of India, this post gives a brief about the state-level MMPs. The intent of these MMPs cannot be appreciated enough, but does everyone realize the benefits of these programs made possible through application of IT ? Read my comments in bold against each MMP below and post your comments as well. (source: http://mit.gov.in)

Land Records (NLRMP) http://dolr.nic.in/Nlrmp.htm	The National Land Records Modernization Program (NLRMP) has been formulated by merging two Centrally Sponsored schemes of Computerization of Land Records (CLR) and Strengthening of Revenue Administration and Updating of Land Records (SRA&ULR). Several departments are involved in managing land records in most of the States, and the citizen has to approach 3 to 4, or even more, agencies for complete land records leading to waste of time, exposure to rent seeking, and harassment This MMP provides the citizens free accessibility to the land records thereby reducing interface with the Government functionaries, rent seeking and harassment. If this is being implemented as envisaged, would it not solve 25% of corruption problems in the country?
Road Transport http://morth.nic.in/	Under the Transport MMP, all the RTOs in the country will implement standardized software - Sarathi (for driver licenses) and Vahan (for vehicle registrations and permits). The Transport MMP also intends to setup National and State Registers. The setting up of these Registers will facilitate in providing the real time services to the citizens. Undoubtedly, this will form a touch-point with Government for many citizens.
Agriculture http://agricoop.nic.in/	The proposed scheme (NeGP-A) aims to provide an integrated and seamless interface to the farmers for making informed decisions. Additionally, under the proposed scheme, information is proposed to be delivered using multiple delivery channels such as the internet, government offices, touch screens, Krishi Vigyan Kendras, electronic media, Kisan Call Centres, Agri-Clinics, Common Service Centres and mobile phones , which will enable easy access to information for the farmer. If this is implemented across the country, does it not take away all farmers problems (except for natural calamities and access to enough funds) ?
Police (CCTNS)	Provide Enhanced Tools for Investigation, Crime Prevention, Law & Order Maintenance and other functions like Traffic Management, Emergency Response. I am sure it must have helped with the internal efficiency in police functioning, but are the citizens less intimidated to approach police because of application of IT?
Treasuries http://finmin.nic.in/	The State Treasuries are the structural and financial unit of the Government Financial System and are responsible for handling the day-to-day transactions of receipt and payment of Government. This project will promote real-time reconciliation of accounts, strengthen Management Information Systems (MIS), and improve accuracy and timeliness in accounts preparation. I wonder when this treasury would be disclosed to the public in real-time !
Municipality http://jnnurm.nic.in/	This initiative envisages covering Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) in 35 mission cities identified, from 15 states (~ 80 ULBs), having more than 1 million population as per 2001 census to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of delivery of municipal services to citizens. I guess there is good progress, but are we anywhere near the end-goal?
e-District	This project aims at providing support to the basic administrative unit i.e. 'District Administration' by undertaking backend computerization to enable electronic delivery of high volume citizen centric government services which would optimally leverage and utilize the three infrastructure pillars of State Wide Area Networks (SWAN), State Data Centers (SDC) and Common Service Centers (CSCs) to deliver services to the citizen at his doorsteps. How come no one - including government employees - talk about the benefits of IT being applied at the district level? Is it that people are not able to see any benefits or things are taken for granted?
Commercial Taxes	Sales tax/VAT is one of the most important sources of indirect taxes for the purpose of taxation by the State Governments. The tax is levied and appropriated by the States on sale of goods. The Commercial Taxes Departments in the States are entrusted with the administration and enforcement of commercial Tax legislations. Commercial Taxes MMP will support the States and UTs Governments to computerize their Commercial Tax administering departments.
Gram Panchayat http://panchayat.gov.in	Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) in India is a concept of local self governance, which promotes decentralized governance by participation of the ordinary public in their own governance. PRIs function at the village, intermediate (block) and district level. Planning & Budgeting, Accounting, Scheme implementation and monitoring, Social Audit and Grievance redress are some of the services envisaged under this MMP. Has any third-party every conducted an independent study to ascertain the benefits of IT-enablement of Panchayats?
Employment Exchange (EE)	The overall aim of the EEMMP is to provide gainful employment to all job-seekers registered with Employment Exchanges by facilitating interaction between jobseekers and employers and disseminating accurate and consistent labor market information to the policy makers on time. Wonderful program ! Not sure who would still register with these employment exchanges, though.