Government set to ban Gmail, Yahoo et al for official use

Call it PRISM fallout or Snowden impact- in a latest move the Indian Government has decided to ban all email communications routed through private US based email services like Gmail or Yahoo and others. According to latest news reports J. Satyanarayana, Secretary, DEITY has indicated this impending move by the Government on the sidelines of the CII Cloud Summit 2013. Reports say that the Government will put in place an official email policy and it seems it's in the advanced stages and fructify by end of this year.

Once the email policy comes in vogue, Government employees need to use only official email IDs and services provided by NIC. It is also learnt that Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DEITY) have asked the feedback from all the ministries aimed at arriving at parity. More than 6 lakh Government employees pan India will come under the ambit of the proposed new email policy. 
A report in leading business daily quoting J.Satyanarayana, said that the overall project cost is expected to be in excess of Rs 50 crore, but to rollout the services by year end, the NIC servers needs to be upgraded and that calls for around Rs 5 crore in the short term.

Functional Issues

However it is still unclear how the Government will roll out this project. Unlike private sector, right from the IAS officers to the section clerks- they all use private web based email services. This shows that right now the email processes are at a ‘chaotic level' and what kind of policy guidelines will take it to a managed level is to be seen. Moreover allocation of official email IDs right now is a cumbersome process and it is to be seen what kind of simplification measures the Government will put in place.

In this backdrop, despite the challenges the email policy is a welcome move but how quickly the Government can transition its employees to the new system? This is both daunting and a challenging task. There are also change management issues and other related guidelines need to be framed- like the Government employees access to social media sites and will they be allowed to use web based mail ( for personal reasons) at all in office?

This and numerous questions remain right now, hopefully the Government factors in all these issues and come out with a comprehensive email policy that achieves the intent- safeguarding critical information.

What do you think- Will the Government's email policy work? Is it practical for the Government to roll out this project pan India? Do you think the time has come for each State to have a Government appointed CIO - who will jump start IT adoption within Government departments?

Let's hear your views!