Dr Neikiesalie (Nicky) Kire and others during the inauguration of KMC Online Services in Kohima on March 30. (Morung Photo)
Our Correspondent
Kohima | March 30
In a welcome step, Kohima Municipal Council (KMC) has been connected with online municipal services today, thereby becoming the first municipal in Nagaland to go digital.
This online service is an initiative of Kohima Smart City Development Limited (KSCDL) under the project of Integrated Command & Control Centre (ICCC).
Inaugurating the online services, Nagaland Urban Development & Municipal Affairs Advisor Dr Neikiesalie (Nicky) Kire called upon the denizens to make the best use of the service.
With this online services, he said, the citizens can now access and get their works done from anywhere without physical presence at KMC office, which would in one way ease the traffic congestion in the state capital, Kohima. Dr Nicky maintained that Kohima city is changing with better road, more footpath, smart city streetlights, CCTVs etc.
KSCDL, Chief Executive Office, Er K Theunuo said that one of the key objectives of smart city mission is to make use of innovation and technology to improve existing systems. “In the past and even in the present, most of the office works are done manually which include providing services to citizens which result in lot of inefficiencies thereby hampering quick communication, approvals and decisions,” he said adding that with the advent of digital technology, “we as smart city have also taken this step to introduce online digital systems by using the latest available software technology.”
This will propel our city and our state to not just become relevant in this digital age but become a leader in eGovernance and ultimately become a digital society and a digital government, he said.
The world, country and the state was in lock down but our smart city team continued to work despite all the challenges of the pandemic to complete this ICCC project, he said adding that this ICCC project comprises of the state of the art control center along with the field components such as smart street lights, automated traffic management systems, environment sensors, city surveillance CCTVs and “today we are introducing this eGovernance module in the form of eKMC.”
With introduction of eKMC, citizens can now apply for KMC services such as trade license, sales permit, temporary permit, advertisement permit, residential certificate to start with.
This is a complete end-to-end online system so that citizens and local entrepreneurs can apply for these services from anywhere and at any time by just using their mobile phones or laptops without requiring to physically visit the office and even make payments online.
Er Theunuo informed that the KMC office will also be able to process and approve the applications completely online.
The approved licenses and certificates will also be digital and payments can also be done both online and offline as per the convenience of the applicant.
In addition to KSCDL, NIC has developed additional services for KMC through their service plus platform which will be integrated to this eKMC as a single window system.
Meanwhile, KSCDL CEO thanked KMC officials-starting from Administrator Lanusenla, Secretary Zakie, Chief Inspector and Inspector team and the entire staff for taking up proactive role from the design phase to the training, capacity building and implementation to become the first municipal in Nagaland to go digital and make history.
He also thanked officials from IT department, NISG and National eGovernance Division, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and the IT division, KSCDL for supervising the design and development of this online system with the Master System Integrator - Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) and their software implementation agency TACT along with the payment gateway provider PayTM for working even during the difficult pandemic times to successfully implement this project.
“Kohima smart city is also more than happy to provide the knowledge and support to other municipalities with our best practices. We hope that other cities in Nagaland and North-East will also take this opportunity to learn the best practices from Kohima smart city as we all aspire and strive towards becoming truly smart cities under the Smart Cities Mission,” he added.
Earlier, the programme was chaired by KMC Administrator T Lanusenla Longkumer while Er Ketusezo Rote, Associate Analyst, IT, KSCDL proposed vote of thanks.
