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We want to make MeeSeva as the single entry and exit point for the citizens in our state

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DQI Bureau
New Update

Whom would you like to give the maximum credit for winning the e-Readiness award?

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Though the Dept of Information Technology and Communications played a key catalyzing role in the entire process, it's the leadership at the top that brought the departments together around the utility of the concept for getting their processes re-engineered and by making use of the technology. Important components of e-Readiness like creation/updation of databases, developing front-end and back-end applications, strengthening connectivity, procuring digital signatures and training field-functionaries in their usage, establishing additional CSCs, etc, were identified and work was started simultaneously on all these components.

As an administrator/bureaucrat, what are the management practices you follow to ensure that you take all stakeholders along in the e-Governance journey?

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. MeeSeva is an example where we had to play all the three roles of the change leadership know when to play which role. The leadership needed both strategic insight as well as execution. The execution needed a culture with robust dialogue-one that brings reality to the surface through openness, candor, and informality.

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The process of change needed clear articulation, communication and conflict resolution especially with regard to the acceptance of the new digital environment perceived as a loss of official power and position. This was also done by building movement for change and creating a network of evangelists (CIOs) at all management levels in various departments.

What are the pitfalls that, in your opinion, should be avoided to make e-Governance successful?

A technology intensive multi-disciplinary projects require the entire range of parallel and sequential activities to converge together around the same time which necessitates effective role playing by all stakeholders working together as a team. This needs a lot of patience, assertiveness and exceptional ability to listen and reach conclusions after listening to all sides, and the tendency to speak frankly with everyone, whether they are above or below the authority.

Government process re-engineering is an essential prerequisite and should also in turn become a major byproduct of any e-Gov initiative. The ultimate objective of any such process should not be automation of existing government processes but to improve the overall efficiency and effectiveness of government service delivery for benefitting the citizens.

Any project should be demand driven and should be seen as a realization of the direct and manifested will of the citizen. It should also allow a relook into age-old archaic procedures. Any such effort should be measured in terms of the wider digital inclusion of the entire population towards development and growth.

The projects should also avoid the deeply rooted technological determinism which assumes that the layering of ICTs in development alone will automatically solve many pre-existing constraints related to gender, caste, feudalism, privilege and traditional exercises of power, factors which limit the real potential of ICTs in citizen-centric service delivery in particular and development in general.

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