Kohima, February 9: In Nagaland, e-governance programme was initially conceptualized in 2003, and since then, department of information technology has been doing whatever it can to promote it.
In the last few years, Government of India has placed special emphasis on e-governance with the sole aim of bringing information and services through Information Communication Technology (ICT) to the remotest corner of the country.
E-governance as a concept was initially meant to improve government decision making, increase accountability and reliability and also promote faster flow of information to the citizens.
“Our ultimate aim is to create an IT savvy society that is trustworthy and efficient but we are still a long way towards achieving our goal,” said K.D. Vizo, commissioner & secretary for IT&C at the recently concluded sensitization workshop on e-governance organized by National Institute of Electronics & Information Technology (NIELIT).
Vizo said that way back in July 2004, the state government under the chairmanship of chief minister Neiphiu Rio had approved the IT policy of Nagaland. However, he maintained that most of the departments have not done much to promote IT culture, and stated “if we are to catch up with the rest of the country the time has now come for each and every department to pay some attention to the much neglected area of IT.”
According to IT policy of Nagaland, all the departments are to earmark 2-3% of its annual plan budget for IT/e-governance related activities, set up IT task force under the chairmanship of the AHoD concerned, and prepare a five year IT plan. Further, all departments are to create their own websites and upload all important information on their website, and all existing government employees are to be given computer training.
The state government has also decided to introduce SMART ID card for all government employees which will be linked to centralized personnel information system.
The commissioner & secretary said that now all AHoDs/HoDs need to review how far IT policy has been implemented in their respective departments.
Attributing the delay in implementation of IT policy to acute shortage of manpower at all levels, Vizo said “currently IT directorate have only seven regular officers and seven regular supporting staff which is abnormally low as compared to other neighboring states.” He added that IT department needs to have at least 50 regular staff to carry forward the state IT policy.
Further, stating that, despite not having a building of its own, IT department has been trying its best to copy e-governance style of countries like Singapore and Israel, Vizo requested all the departments to support the IT department in e-governance initiatives.
