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A Single-Window Experience

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DQI Bureau
New Update

The Chandigarh Administration declared its IT policy in April 2000, to

promote the application of Information Technology for the benefit of the

residents of Chandigarh, by implementing e-Governance and by promoting

investment in the field of technology. With the launch of the e-Sampark Project,

the first phase of e-Governance was implemented in August 2004, followed by the

commencement of financial transactions through Sampark Centers from November

2004.

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The Chandigarh Administration has decided to set up

Electronic Citizen Service Centers across the city. The project has been

developed on priority and is highly visible, with immediate benefit to citizens

and improvements in the services provided by the Chandigarh Administration, by

bringing together all the departments under one single umbrella.

Before e-Sampark



Before the project came into being, a citizen of Chandigarh
had to visit various departments physically, scattered across the city; stand in

long queues; make multiple visits for completing a single transaction; wait for

few days to few weeks; and at times, face harassment due to lack of

transparency. The administration had overworked staff, a poor image of the

department in the eyes of the citizens, and insufficient MIS resulting in lack

of control, for example tracking of outstanding bills.

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Before the launch of the e-Sampark project, these services

were available at separate offices as independent islands with duplication of

work, slow processing, inefficiency in system and slow service delivery time

often resulting in large crowds waiting for the services.

Departments

Covered and Sevices provided by e-Sampark

The key objectives behind the implementation of the project

were to provide for hassle free one-stop solution to the citizens; minimize

multiple interaction points for the citizens and hence reducing the wastage of

their valuable time; and to provide for better turn around time in receipt,

processing and issue of services.

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The Changing Face



Today e-Sampark is a 'One-stop-shop' for over 11 G2C services
through five eSampark Centers. In a very small time frame of six months the

transaction numbers are increased from zero to 150,000 from five e-Sampark

centers. In next two months three additional such centers are planned by

Chandigarh Administration. This will result in approx one lakh transactions per

month. Not only this, as a second phase of the project, it is envisaged to

introduce non government services as part of the project such as phone bills etc

which are expected to increase the transactions many times.

Performance and Results



A unique feature of the e-Sampark project is Chandigarh

Administration's decision to deliver every service from e-Sampark free of cost.

Every month new services are being added to significantly boost the number of

users. Adoption of public private partnership resulting in efficient allocation

of risk between the government and private partner supported by the encouraging

payment mechanism is expected to provide sustainability to the project.

Initially fixed rate model is adopted for the project. The Chandigarh Project

was launched in September 2004. In 4 months, 11 services were established. This

is a huge success achieved by the e-Sampark centers.

Entire

solution is based on



Oracle Technology

Server Side Scripting:

PSP(PL/SQL Server Pages)



RDBMS: Oracle9i Enterprise Edition


Application Server: Oracle 9i AS


Operating System: Linux RedHat AS3.0


Data Porting Utility: Visual Basic 6.0


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Technology Used



A centralized architecture is adopted for the implementation

of the project. The entire architecture can be divided into three sections-data

center, Sampark centers, and portal.

Interoperability: e-Sampark is entirely a Web based solution.

Hence the client who is accessing the application needs only to have a Web

Browser installed on his system irrespective of any operating system.

Open Source Software Systems: Linux has been used as the

operating system, for which the source code is publicly available-referred to

as open-source software. Open source software goes one step beyond freeware. Not

only does it provide the software for free, it provides the original source code

used to create the software. Linux is the best-known example; others include

Apache.

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Security: e-Sampark project has two types of access

connectivity:

  • Intranet Connectivity

  • Internet Connectivity

The Sampark centers are connected with dedicated

communication links to NIC Network and Data Center (NDC). Thus there is minimal

outside scope for security breach.

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Scalability and Reliability: The system is highly scalable in

terms of hardware and software. Hardware resources can be upgraded easily if the

system load increases. In terms of software, it is purely oracle-based solution,

which can be easily upgraded to the newer versions.

Project Sustainability



e-Sampark has tied up the Unit Trust of India (UTI) to

facilitate banking services. The project has shown phenomenal growth rate in

terms of number of transactions conducted as well. Since the launch of its first

center in September 2004, Chandigarh Administration served more than 150,000

citizens through five e-Sampark centers.

Adoption of public private partnership resulting in the

efficient allocation of risk between the government and private partner

supported by the encouraging payment mechanism is expected to provide

sustainability to the project. Initially fixed rate model is adopted for the

project and Chandigarh Administration has agreed to pay a fixed cost per

transaction to the BOT operator for the services provided. The model has

flexibility for inclusion of more services, which is based on differential

pricing based on the type and volume of transaction. The service centers

selected for the project are located in Government provided/owned buildings.

These are the locations where the citizen services are already provided by

Electricity Department. This has resulted in minimal upfront investment from

Administration.

The project is presently using the e-Sampark centers and the

Internet as channels for delivery of services but the model, in addition to

horizontal expansion to different channels and locations such as banks, ATMs,

kiosks, BPMs, is also capable of vertical expansion such as to various

government services/ departments integration, and private services integration.

Rajula S and GP Sahu,

Department of Management Studies, IIT Delhi

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