‘The concept has potential to transform the lives of people. Give it fair chance'

Around 11 a.m. on December 27, when the nation was gripped by the debate on the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Bill, 2011, Communications and Information Technology Minister Kapil Sibal rose to table another Bill in the Lok Sabha. It would have an equally far-reaching impact on the lives of the citizens.

Described as “transformative” as well as something that might create “a fair amount of ambiguity” in the way government departments work, the Electronic Delivery of Services Bill, 2011, has elicited a lot of interest. It has raised the anticipation of those who have, for long, sought to leverage the power of technology to improve governance structures and the mechanisms through which public services are delivered.

The Bill seeks to provide government services and certificates to people electronically on their doorstep, sparing them “exploitation by officials.” Once it becomes an Act, all Central and State government departments will be mandated to publish a list of services that are electronically available within 180 days and will start rolling them out within five years. Since the delivery of such services is time-bound, penalties up to Rs.20,000 could be levied on errant officials.

The receipt of forms and applications, issue or grant of licence, permit, certificate, sanction or approval and the receipt and payment of money — all of them can be done through the Internet.

Chakshu Roy of the Delhi-based PRS Legislative Research, an independent research initiative, said: “The government is currently in engagement mode. At least two rounds of consultations were held with representatives from outside the government to draft this Bill. But in all this Lokpal hungama, a lot of people haven't heard about this landmark legislation.”

E-governance per se is not a new concept in India. The Central and State governments spend over Rs.3, 000 crore a year on e-governance initiatives. But the question is whether the expenditure has had any noticeable impact on the lives of those who wait in long queues to avail themselves of government services.

Legal commitment

All that the Bill attempts to do is to make e-governance services into legal commitments, says Mr. Roy. But he cautions that the Bill may overlap with other big-thrust legislation such as the proposed Public Services Delivery Bill and the Information Technology Act, 2000, which talks about delivering e-services through public-private partnerships.

“If you look at it in an administrative sense, the government departments would not differentiate e-services and regular services. It might just create a fair amount of ambiguity, and officials would follow provisions which are the most favourable to them.” It may also pave the way for the entry of the private sector, just like the Tata Consultancy Services partnering the government to collect and verify passport application information.

Fragmented set-up

Jitendra Shah, a professor at the Indian Institute of Technology-Mumbai and information technology consultant to the Maharashtra government, says that while e-service commitments can make a difference, the government's ability to deliver is severely restricted by the lack of raw data in standardised formats. “Our whole e-governance set-up was conceived in a fragmented manner. Each department does its own thing. All other countries have national standards. But for decades, there has not been a national mandate in India to standardise and integrate all available government data. Obviously, there are forces out there that do not want it.”

Citizen-profiling

Kris Dev, co-founder of the Transparency and Accountability Network, an NGO, suggests that the government try some means of citizen-profiling, now that the Unique Identity Project is in the doldrums. “There has to be a digital footprint of each request and complaint, otherwise it is easy to fudge. That is one problem that keeps surfacing in our field surveys — in the public distribution system, anganwadis and noon-meal programmes. E-governance has the potential to transform the lives of people. It has to be given a fair chance.”