Public Service Delivery - Breaking the Tyranny of Ink Signatures

Public Service Delivery - Breaking the Tyranny of Ink Signatures

Public Service Delivery has always been plagued by many ills and the transaction level hardships which citizens face in accessing basic services cause a greater damage to the reputation of Government and Governance in general, more than anything else.

The core reason for many of these problems arises from the air of mystification about procedures concerning service delivery. Even today 9 of 10 people who have a valid driving license are not aware of the actual procedure of getting a license. In view of lack of information, perceptions of hassles involved in dealing with the licensing authority and general keenness to save time by adopting shortcuts, most of us prefer to take the middleman route by paying a premium of a few hundred rupees and getting a hassle free driving license. This becomes the norm rather than an exception and the result is for all of us to see in the scant respect that we have of traffic rules and the chaos that we see on our roads. The story is similar, for a ration card or a passport, and most of these service centers are characterized by long queues at delivery points which also require multiple visits. In most cases, outcome is always in suspense. No wonder, gatekeepers mushroom at every turn leading to poor quality of Service and thus Service becomes a Mercy rather than a Right.

The above situation magnifies manifold when one looks at the number of interactions a citizen has with the Government. Typically a farmer has almost 40 interactions with 8 Government Departments every year. An urban citizen has around 50 interactions with 10 departments; a medium industry will have 120 interactions with 20 departments. Similarly for large industry, students, senior citizens etc. The question that comes is that can we do anything to streamline these interactions and improve the experience that citizens have while dealing with the Government.

Actually there have been projects and interventions which have not only improved citizen service delivery but has also brought in efficiency, reliability and accountability in delivery of services. Some of these interventions include Railways, Banking, Bhoomi Land Records, MCA 21 etc. The underlying feature of all these initiatives has been use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in improving public service delivery. ICT helps to reach the unreached and reducing the cost of accessing services. It also directly results in bringing in transparency and thereby reducing corruption.

These e Governance initiatives which have leveraged ICT tools to improve service delivery have made significant advances in the last few years. Today almost all public offices up to the block level are connected on a dedicated Optical Fibre based State Wide Area Network (SWAN). With the linkages of SWAN with the Gigabit National Knowledge Network (NKN) and the proposed Bharat Broadband Network (BBN) which will connect all Panchayats with Optical Fibre, the necessary infrastructure with regard to connecting public offices is already there. The critical challenge here is ensuring uptime of the network and optimal utilization of the network for delivery of services. Further under State Data Center (SDC) project, data centers are being set up in all States. Already almost 16 States have the infrastructure in place and together with the capacity available nationally and use of technologies like Virtualization and Cloud Computing, storage is no more a challenge in electronic service delivery.

The most important component under National e Governance Plan (NeGP) has been the Common Services Centers (CSC) project. So far around 90,000 CSCs have been set up across the country. However, there are issues with regard to many of these centers primarily on account of challenges in getting connectivity, lack of power supply and inadequate number of G2C services, which directly impact the sustainability and viability of these centers. Inspite of the challenges that exist, more than 40,000 centers are reporting around 150 transactions per month and the total transaction volumes run into hundreds of crores. This infrastructure of CSCs and kiosks should be seen in light of the fact that the entire network has been primarily set up on a Public Private Partnership model and the actual expenditure by Government on these centers in the form of revenue viability gap funding has been less than 100 Crores. Worldwide, the CSC network is regarded as one of the biggest telecenter networks as the next biggest network is of less than ten thousand centers. The CSCs across the country have stood the test of time and are providing direct employment to around 100,000 youth. They have taken technology, innovation and entrepreneurship to the doorsteps of people living in the remotest rural areas of the country and there is a strong need for a policy push to support the entrepreneurs and Service Center Agencies to ensure their sustainability and viability. This network is a must for the overall e Governance strategy as they are the prime centers which will provide assisted access to people who do not have access to a computing device, connectivity or skills to access online services on their own.

The only way one can address the Governance challenges for better service delivery is to optimally leverage the e Infrastructure of SWANs, SDCs and CSCs. There is a push needed for enabling services on this network. The Mission Mode Projects (MMP), in particular, the e District MMP, seeks to achieve this. The idea has been to enable anywhere anytime delivery of online services without having to visit public offices. The strategy allowed people to apply for services from CSCs and get the services at CSCs through a web enabled application. The backend is automated to enable electronic data flow between public offices and issuance of digitally signed certificates and documents. This transformed Governance as there was no need for visiting a public office. What it also required was enabling Government Orders and Notifications which gave legal validity to digitally signed documents which anyway is applicable as per the provisions of the IT Act. Uniquely numbered and bar coded certificates – for birth, death, caste, income, records of rights etc enabled online verification of these documents also. This brought in a unique concept – as the age old conventional – ink signed and rubber stamped – certificates were no more the proof of an ultimate sarkaari document. Digitally signed and digitally verifiable documents proved to be much more simple, secure and verifiable. Shri J Satyanarayana, Secretary, DeITY, calls it Breaking the Tyranny of Ink Signatures!!

Infact the State of Andhra Pradesh, which has been a pioneer in IT and e Governance, has gone a step further in this direction. The Mee Seva project launched in November 2011 in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh is creating waves with regard to the paradigm shift it has brought about in public service delivery. What Mee Seva does is to focus on across the counter Service Delivery rather than applying for a Service and getting a Service later, even at a Common Services Center. Under the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008, the State has framed Andhra Pradesh Information Technology (Electronic Service Delivery Rules) 2011, which enables authorized signatories to digitally sign the Certificates and Documents which are issued on secured stationary. Services are classified into two categories. Category A services are those that can be delivered across the counter by the Mee Seva operator, who is like the Village Level Entrepreneur of a CSC. Category B services are those which require back end operations from concerned office of the issuing authority. The Category B services are further classified into two categories based on the nature and back-end process involved for delivering the service. Category B1 services are those that can be moved to Category A from the second and subsequent request onwards. Category B2 services are those which are Transactional/Statutory in nature where Notices/Hearings/Field Inspections are required.

For a Service to be classified under Category A, the essential prerequisite is existence of an accurate and dynamic digital database which would enable the kiosk operator to deliver the service by accessing the information from a Secure State Electronic Certificate Repository (SECR) without asking for any supporting documents. Category B services are those for which no digital database is available. For these services, paper records may be available and there will be a need to scan, archive and digitally sign the record and place it in the SECR to move to the Category A. In some cases a field inspection or detailed enquiry may be required to confirm and corroborate the available information. In these services the applicant is required to submit supporting documents as per a predefined checklist. The Mee Seva architecture leverages all the components of NeGP – namely the SWAN, SDC, CSCs and the State Service Delivery Gateway (SSDG). Its functionality includes having a single source of digital signature repository, payment mechanism and SECR. The strategy is to migrate all services – legacy, SSDG and e District on to the Mee Seva Platform. It provides a common interface for all Services. Within 5 months of its launch in Chittoor district, already 17 Services are available on the Platform and almost 180,000 transactions have taken place. Of the 17 Services, 5 are of Category A and 7 are of Category B. Almost one third of the transactions are of Category A. Together with B1 services, they account for almost 90% of transactions. Thus it is possible to ultimately ensure bulk of transaction in an across the counter mode. State has plans to add almost 50 more services to the Mee Seva platform and the initiative is almost ready to be launched in other districts of Andhra Pradesh. With porting of almost 50 SSDG services and the e District services, it is anticipated that almost 200 services will be available to citizens on the Mee Seva Platform. It’s an amazing achievement of Sanjay Jaju, IT Secy, AP and his team.

Once the services on such a platform are stabilized, it is possible to ultimately eliminate the requirement of any kinds of certificates to be submitted by citizens to various public authorities. After authenticating a citizen’s identity with something like a UID, it should be possible for Government databases to talk to each other and fetch information as required rather than making a courier of every citizen and making him deliver information between various public offices.

The above strategy is being incorporated in the National Rollout of e District Mission Mode Project and is expected that we will ultimately be able to improve public service delivery by Breaking the Tyranny of Ink Signatures.

Abhishek Singh

PS: Views expressed are personal

Narendra Kumar, IPS and what his sacrifice means for all of us

Narendra Kumar, IPS and what his sacrifice means for all of us!

The news of the killing of Narendra Kumar, IPS in Morena, Madhya Pradesh has shocked all of us. One cannot imagine that in the heart of India, criminals will have the audacity of running over a tractor over a senior police official. In such cases, one would normally assume that the driver of the tractor doing illegal mining, will run away and later the real benefactors will pursue with the police and administration to get the tractor released. The very act of this not happening and the brutal killing of the IPS officer points to a larger conspiracy. Mining has been a major area of corruption across the country. The stakes are high and we all know the powers that the illegal mining mafia wields in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh or Uttar Pradesh.

The reach and influence of the mafia can be gauged by just looking at the kind of people who are given the portfolio of mining across the States of the country. Normally, the most corrupt of the people, who are directly associated with the finances of the ruling party, handle this portfolio in the Council of Ministers. It is also common knowledge that even officials, both civil and police, lobby to get postings in districts rich in mining. In Uttar Pradesh, it was rumoured that postings in Sonbhadra district are actually auctioned. It points to a large scale nexus between politicians, bureaucrats and the mining mafia. This is an endemic problem and if it has to be resolved, it would require a firm resolve right from the top political leaders of a State. It is not up to a SDPO or a SDM to solve the problem. The issue at hand is no less than that of the liquor mafia or the coal mafia. We all know the influence exercised by liquor barons in Governments.

So what does this mean? Does it imply that field level officials can do nothing about such transgressions? What should a young SDM or SDPO do when faced with such challenges? We have been discussing this informally with colleagues in the IAS and I am thrilled at the resolve being shown by some of the younger officers. Infact, in the aftermath of the Morena incident, one suggestion came which called upon all field officers across the country to launch a concerted drive against all illegal mining, to seize vehicles and don’t release them for a long time. This would have a nationwide impact on the activities of the mafia and hurt them financially as the cost of hiring mining equipment is fairly high. There are colleagues who have pointed out High Court rulings which have upheld orders issued for penalizing Rs One Lakh per truck for illegal mining as also for penalties of Rs 48000 per truck for overloading. These orders were passed under Land Revenue Act and Section 133 CrPC.
Thus there seem to be sufficient legal legroom available to deal with such matters. We must use all legal avenues available to us to deal with this problem. Very often what bothers many of us is why political pressure is put to release vehicles that were seized for illegal mining or why there is a lot of interest of MLAs and Ministers in putting pressure on going easy on the mining mafia. The answers are simple. These guys are stakeholders – either direct or indirect. We must not forget that MLAs, MPs and Ministers are politicians and they are dependent on votes for their jobs. To win elections, they need a lot of people to work for them. After they win the elections, there is not much that they can do for their supporters. Even winning elections does not guarantee that his party will form the Government and even if the MLA is part of the ruling party, it is not guaranteed if he will get a ministerial berth. Even if he is lucky, it is not guaranteed that he will have a plum portfolio or a Secretary who will allow him to make money. Today, the investments required to contest elections is huge and given the low probability of recovering the investment it becomes a high stakes game for these guys. None of these guys are there for the love of the land – like Gandhi, Nehru or Bose in the pre 1947 era. Those freedom fighters quit lucrative professions for the risk of fight against the British. They had the lofty goal of Freedom to look up to. Today, I and You will not join politics nor will we let anyone close in our families to do so. Today only guys who have no other options left join politics. Or those leaders, popularly known as Youth Brigade or Baba Log, who are sons and daughters of politicians of yesterday who have a constituency to inherit.

With regard to ways to handle request of politicians, a senior politician in Uttar Pradesh told me an interesting story, a few years back. When I could not do some work for one of his supporters as the same was not possible as per rules, he told me that had the same been possible as per Rules, the person would not have gone to him. As per him, most of his supporters come to him for work that does not get done in the normal course of law and he cannot avoid making requests on behalf of his supporters. He felt it is upto officers to handle such matters. Infact in a way they do their job in following up on demands from their supporters. We must do our job in refusing to agree to requests or demands that are illegal. Unfortunately many of us agree to do things that are illegal as we want to please them in the desire of better career options or plum postings and at times for illegal considerations. No wonder, someone said some time back that when we are asked to bend, we crawl. That's where the problems start.

In order to how do we deal with such politicians, I would also recommend watching the Yes Minister Series again as it has some valuable lessons on how to deal with politicians! Also, one should know where to draw the line. We should never compromise on our principles. Normally the worst that would happen is a transfer! Incidents like the one in MP are sad and tragic. We have to be aware of the risks involved, be careful and keep our team and seniors informed when dealing with hard core criminals. Never try to take things individually. The might of the State must be used to deal with such elements. I can say that having dealt worse situations in Nagaland where even the armed forces also think before dealing directly with AK 47 wielding militants. Life is too big to sacrifice. You have lots to do. Ultimately, our jobs are important but not more than life and love of our near and dear ones. Use tact and law to deal with such situations. Bottom line is that don't ever think of doing something that can cost your life. It is not worth it. The Nation will forget you soon. How many of us remember Dr L V Reddy, IAS(85) who was killed as DC Kohima or Ved Prakash IPS (89) who was killed as SP Mokokchung or Dashrath IAS(94) who lost his life in Manipur or my batchmate and dear friend Ajay Singh who was killed as SP Lohardaga in Jharkhand. In almost all these cases, the guilty have neither been caught nor punished. The media and society will also forget you soon. Only people who grieve them every day and every year is their families. Moral of the Story - Please do take care in whatever you do.

Abhishek Singh
abhish18@hotmail.com

PS: Views expressed above are my personal.

Open Data and Open Government : Opportunities and Challenges

Open Data and Open Government : Opportunities and Challenges

This week I attended a Workshop on the need for a Global Policy on Open Data at the Internet Governance Form at Nairobi. Christopher Corbin from UK was in the Chair and my co panelists included Professor Anne Fitzegerad from Queensland University, Ms Waltraut Ritter from Knowledge Dialogues, Hongkong, and Dr Rajshree Dutta from CSDMS, India. The session was quiet lively with interesting interventions from Dorothy Gordon of Ghana, Maria Lee Hoon of IDRC and other participants from World over. The event was actively followed on the webcast and twitter thanks to the tweets of @MGPSI and @josemalonso.

The key theme of the Workshop was on the need for a Global Policy framework for Public Sector Information online. This article is about the thoughts I shared at the Workshop.

Open Government is a concept with which no well meaning democratic Government can disagree with. Open Government is all about transparency, public participation and collaboration which will bring in efficiency, reliability and accountability in delivery of public services. India has taken the policy initiative of enacting the Right to Information in 2005 which ensures that all information can be shared with people who seek them. It further calls for an obligation of the Government to disclose voluntarily information to the citizens. Section 4(1) of the RTI Act 2005 requires Government to digitize all records and make them available over a network. Accordingly, India is building an Open Data Platform (data.gov.in) which will place all information and data of the Government, except a negative list, in the public domain.

However, what needs to be understood is that Open Data Policy is more than mere technology, or a data.gov portal or just doing it for the sake of transparency. Open Data Policy has a lot to do with Governance, Social, Economic, Political and Legal Issues. The real issue is that how do we ensure that all relevant data is put in an organized for. It’s necessary to define the metadata standards to be able to link the datasets of multiple Government departments.
The benefits for an open Data policy are immense. Once data is put in an open domain on a platform, entrepreneurs, developers and innovators will have access to this data and they will be able to build mashable applications on top of this and offer useful services on mobile platform. Infact this is the most critical aspect as ultimately putting Data on an Open platform is not an end in itself. Data must lead to enabling services which will be useful for the people.

A challenge that Governments face in migrating to an Open Data platform and an Open Government policy is that there is lot of resistance from within the Government as many functionaries feel that it’s extra effort that they have to put and more importantly most functionaries do not want to let go of the control over data and information that they have now. Given the potential an Open Data regime and Open Government policy has for Governance and Accountability, it is worthwhile for Governments to build in awareness and capacity building of Government functionaries from top to bottom to ensure that the implementation of the policy does not see roadblocks. It will require extensive Change Management sessions as it’s an attitudinal and mindset change, we are seeking to achieve.

On the key issue of whether the Global Policy on Public Sector Information can be built upon the OECD and the European Union policy that have been adopted by almost 50 UN Nations, I felt that it might be a bit premature. The level of development of Information Infrastructure and issues of Access and Diversity may require each country to formulate its own road map towards an Open Data Policy. There are Governance and Political issues also and while advocacy towards an Open Data policy is important, what we need to provide is a resource toolkit, knowledge repository about the best practices and metadata standards along with assessment reports on the benefits of an Open Data Policy framework, which will ultimately help more nations to embrace Open Data Policy. The toolkits and metadata standards will be critical from the point of view of integrating data across regions and countries so that applications and services work seamlessly without any borders and boundaries. There are cultural and privacy issues also which differ from nation to nation and each country will need to address them in its own way. The business modeling of sharing revenues from the applications and services developed by innovators and developers with Governments also needs to be addressed.

Another key issue is that in countries where regions and communities are yet to get access to Broadband, what use will an Open Data Portal be? This challenge can be met by first adopting a Right to Information policy which allows people to get access to all information, in electronic mode or in manual mode. The next step can be to provide all information voluntarily on an Open Data Portal and ultimately adopt an Open Government Policy framework. The next step will be to link up Data with Services which ultimately benefit citizens in getting access to better services, innovators to create new business models and revenue streams and Governments to improve Governance and bring in transparency and accountability. All this should be accompanied by extensive awareness building, training and capacity building campaigns to enable smooth transition to an Open Data regime.