Powering the Nation

When the Americans declined to give away the secrets of supercomputing, Dr

Vijay Bhatkar took up the challenge to take India to considerable heights in the

high-powered computing arena. What came up then (a decade ago) was India’s

national initiative for design, development and delivery of high performance

computing (supercomputing systems) and solutions based on parallel processing

technology. The Center for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) has since

then spread its wings even wider.

With the acquired expertise and developed technologies using high performance

computing, C-DAC deployed advanced information technology (IT) based solutions

in a number of areas. The areas were as diverse as seismic data processing to

genome sequence database research, from multilingual computing technologies to

natural language processing and artificial intelligence. C-DAC made its mark by

developing Indian language tools using natural language processing and developed

scripts and font standards using GIST (Graphics and Intelligence based Script

Technology). So the institution that enabled the popularization of multilingual

computing, the move to e-governance was a natural progression.

"Only 5% Indians speak English. Government officials in various

provinces, non-government functionaries and citizens in general, prefer their

own language. If the fruits of information technology are to spread to the grass

root level, it is best done using computers in the local or native

language," says R K Arora, executive director, C-DAC.

It all began in 1997 when the government of Maharashtra decided to implement

e-governance. The government invited five agencies for discussions of which C-DAC

was one. C-DAC was chosen as a turnkey solution provider and began work for five

government departments beginning with the public works department (PWD) and then

stamp and registration, archives, legislative secretariat and land management.

Interestingly, PWD that had gained notoriety as an archaic organization was

among the first to jump onto the e-governance bandwagon. C-DAC developed a suite

of applications for works, accounts to employee management. Over 250 PWD offices

across Maharashtra went online and soon no tender was accepted unless it was

sent online.

The stamps registration department was another success story for C-DAC that

was carried out in the states of Maharashtra and UP. The mandate was to provide

online property registration, valuation and report generation across 366

administrative offices that reduced time delays from several days to just 20

minutes. The number of registered documents increased from 16 to 40 per day

reporting a 15% rise in revenues.

After this came the computerization of the municipal corporations of

Karnataka. Six corporations were computerized. The first phase of the Rs. 2.5

crore project involved computerization of major functions such as property tax

valuation, collection, issue and record of death/birth certificates, water

supply billing, consumer complaints and internal MIS functions. The second phase

involved networking 100 smaller municipalities.

C-DAC built a decision support system (DSS) for Andhra Pradesh building a

data warehouse for both land and its 60 million people. Such a comprehensive

data warehouse was to enable accurate decision making by government officials in

every department.

C-DAC also developed a hospital management system, a GIS-based land

management system and archives’ computerization for effective scanning and

archival of old documents with proper enhancement, indexing and retrieval

facilities.

"All these applications have involved significant technological

components covering the web, data warehousing, database architecture, geomatics

and advanced software tools applied innovatively," remarks Arora.

C-DAC had also consulted projects for the governments of Gujarat and Madhya

Pradesh that involved preparing a framework for statewide policy ad procedure

and standardizing application interfaces. Now C-DAC is undertaking a major

e-governance project for Goa. C-DAC’s role will be to understand the existing

systems, specify the architecture and define a framework for various

e-governance projects.

Nanda Kasabe/CYBER NEWS SERVICE

A Finger in Every Pie

Data warehousing for decision support in the

government Governments

deal with enormous data. In order to ensure that such data is put to effective

use in decision-making, the data warehousing technique is used. It permits

several types of queries requiring complex analysis of data. A project involving

data warehousing has been implemented for the Andhra Pradesh government.

Works management suite

This is a multifunctional application for public works departments (PWDs) and

other construction authorities and captures information at all the stages

through which work progresses. It consists of three systems, Works Management,

Accounts Management and Stores Management. The software has been implemented by

PWD, Maharashtra.

Hospital information system

The aim of HIS is to use a network of computers to

collect, process and retrieve patient care and administrative information from

various departments for all hospital activities to satisfy the functional

requirement of the users. The system has been implemented at the Sanjay Gandhi

Post Graduate Institute (SGPGI), Lucknow and Gurutegh Bahadur Hospital (GTB),

New Delhi.

Stamps and registration software

This software provides an efficient government citizen interface, and also

enables enhanced revenue earnings for stamps and registrations operations. The

heart of this application consists of the Registration and Valuation module. The

project has been running at the IGR, Pune and is proposed to be implemented on a

BOT (Build Operate Transfer) basis with participation from private parties.

Land management system

This application addresses the activities carried out by a corporation engaged

in industrial development. It is an effective tool that captures the land

allotment process, which encompasses various stages like allotment, transfer,

and mortgage surrender of land. Receipt of application, reminder of notice,

reports. The system has been developed for Maharashtra Industrial Development

Corporation (MIDC).

Municipal corporations operation computerization

Important applications for Municipal Corporations includes property tax billing,

water supply billing, death and birth certificates issue, trade license issue

and consumer complaints apart from MIS.

Document management system

The solution provides the facilities to easily store and retrieve the documents.

They are stored using a proper indexing mechanism to facilitate faster search.

The main modules of the solution are document conversion, image enhancement,

document storage and retrieval and document security.

Archives computerization

This application enables effective scanning of various types of modules old

documents with proper enhancements, indexing as per need, their archives and

retrieval. This application has been installed for the department of archives.

Personnel information management system

This software for Personnel Information Management System (PIMS) has been

developed keeping the requirement of a large department with offices at

dispersed locations. It consists of a number of modules such as personnel

information, recruitment, transfer and promotion, pay and disbursement, leaves

record, training and retirement benefits. This software was initially developed

and deployed by PWD, Maharashtra.

Octroi management, Maharashtra

The application aims to eliminate cash transactions at Octroi posts. The credit

account of the transporters or their lump sum deposit is used for debiting the

octroi. Sometimes, where required, bank drafts are given for the value of octroi

to be collected. All octroi posts are to be linked with the head office for

reconciliation of accounts. The whole process minimizes delays and hassles

otherwise encountered by the transporters at the posts. This system has been

implemented Nashik Municipal Corporation in Maharashtra state, linking their 17

octroi posts.

State legistative assembly computerization

A solution to computerize the operations of Legislative Assembly for Maharashtra.

Telephone revenue billing (Pune Telecom)

This software provides billing, collection, accounting, customer care.

Consultancy for developing framework for Information

system planning The job involves

standardization of front-end backend for application interfaces along with the

network topology and components involved. C-DAC is currently executing a

consultancy assignment for the study of the requirements of 20 large departments

of Goa for enabling computerization of activities.

Turnkey solution provider

Maharashtra, Punjab and Kerala have selected it as turnkey solution provider for

their e-governance projects,

Integrated electoral rolls for election commission

A project on the preparation of integrated

electoral rolls with updated entries was successfully completed as per the

guidelines of Election Commission for India, for Maharashtra state. This covers

all 48 Lok Sabha and 288 Assembly constituencies with 5.23 crore voters till

January 1, 2001.

Laboratory management and automation system

Large laboratory infrastructures deal with a variety of processes; apart from

common MIS. These include tests, analysis, certification, quality control and

reports. Also needed are purchase, accounting, billing and planning system

applications. Once automated and integrated, these applications can be of

considerable help in increasing productivity of laboratory functions.