55,000 Common Service Cetnres rolled out across the country : Raja

Over 55,000 Common Service Centres (CSCs) of the 1, 00,000 planned, have been rolled out by various State Governments across the country, under National e-Governance Plan (NeGP). Department of Information Technology (DIT) has prepared a plan to position additional 1, 50,000 CSCs to cover all Panchayats bringing the total number to 2,50,000.

This was stated by Shri A. Raja, the Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology while addressing a conference of ICT Ministers here today. The Minister said these CSCs will deliver services under Bharat Nirman and pr

ovide support to other flagship programmes such as National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and National Rural Health Mission etc.

Currently more than 100 public services are available online including services pertaining to registration and filing of returns by corporations under the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, e-filing of Income Tax returns as well as refunds by Department of Income Tax, e-payment of Direct and Indirect Taxes through 28 National Banks, e-Services for Pensioners through Pensioners’ portal.

In addition to these national services, several states have computerized land records to deliver computerized Record of Rights (ROR), registration of property and conversion of paper based driving licenses to Smart Cards. These have brought considerable relief to the common man especially those who reside in rural underserved areas.

Mr. Raja said, with setting up of CSCs and solving the last mile connectivity hurdle, common man has also to be empowered to reap the benefits. In order to make the access and use of technology and technology enabled services pervasive, the Government has brought out a GNU/ Linux localised desktop distribution, titled Bharat Operating System Solutions (BOSS), targeting to Indian requirements with Indian language support and is expected to meet the various needs of e-Governance and e-Education.

In addition to this, both the industry and the Government need to work closely and the participation of industry in this endeavour is necessary to ensure speedy implementation. To offer industry an opportunity to participate in the delivery of public services, the necessary legal framework has already been enabled.

The Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 effectively enables public-private partnership to execute projects in the area of e-Governance quickly and effectively. As a result manifold increase in the interest as well as implementation of e-Governance projects by the industry has been witnessed. MCA21, Passport and CSCs are shining examples of participation by the Industry in the delivery of Public Services.

Speaking on the occasion Shri Sachin Pilot, MoS, C&IT called for taking necessary steps to intensify the pace of implementation of NeGP. Referring to challenges related to CSCs and connectivity issue, he said the task of the DIT is to provide broadband access to all CSCs. As there is a direct connection between the broadband connectivity and growth digital inclusion of rural areas will greatly contribute to economy, he added..

Earlier, the Secretary, DIT, Shri R. Chandrashekhar, said that we are at a very important thresh hold of this exciting journey and have to move fast from creating infrastructure to actually delivering the services so that the citizens can experience the benefit. (EOM)