Union Minister for Shillong Declaration on e-Governance
SHILLONG: Union DoNER Minister Jitendra Singh on Thursday said the Centre is keen to work for the development of the North Eastern region, including Meghalaya.
He was inaugurating the 22nd national conference on e-Governance 2019 (NCeG), the first ever in North East region, in Shillong on Thursday.
The conference being attended by 535 delegates from 28 states and all Union Territories, should adopt a ‘Shillong Declaration on e-governance’ so that the important takeaways from the sessions may be referred to and developed upon, in the future’ said Singh, who is also the Minister of State for Prime Minister’s Office, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions, Departments of Atomic Energy and Space.
Highlighting the importance of the citizen-centric approach in service delivery, Singh said after the NDA first came into power in 2014, the Prime Minister Narendra Modi had urged to move beyond Vigyan Bhawan.
“We at the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) have been religiously following PM’s vision and holding this conference across the country,” he said.
The PM had earlier defined e-Governance as easy, effective, economical and environmental-friendly governance. The ease of governance would only be possible by Minimum Government and Maximum Governance’, he said.
The Centre has been focusing on this aspect especially in the remotest corners of the country, Singh added.
Singh said that under Prime Minister’s guidance, many initiatives have also been undertaken by the Centre and projects like IRCTC Rail connect app and UMANG app of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) have been rolled out. Because of other initiatives like Jeevan Pramaan, retired civil servants won’t have to travel to bank for submitting life certificates or common citizens can get to know about various schemes being implemented in their area through mobile app, he added.
The minister mentioned that CPGRAMS, the grievance redressal portal of DARPG, is witnessing a significant jump in citizen complaints from what it was five years earlier. This is not because people are not happy with the government, but it is the faith that the people repose in the efficient grievance redressal mechanism, he added. The increase in efficiency of the government can be analysed by comparing figures of disposal of grievances which has gone up to over 95% and that this proves the responsiveness of government, he said.
Singh said the ministry of DoNER is keeping up with the pace of digitization and service delivery through electronic means. It has constantly engaged itself with promoting e-governance initiatives that are being taken up by the North Eastern states and that it has extended its support to various externally aided projects proposed by different Northeastern states in the field of Health (telemedicine), Education (digitisation of classrooms) and others, he added.
For making digital literacy universal, the government has taken key initiatives like Aadhaar and Jan-Dhan Yojana and has laid down the target of completion by 2022, the 75th Independence year of India, he said.
Talking about development in the region, Singh said that states like Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya had never seen a train but now the construction of a double gauge is going on in Arunachal. Admitting that it will take time to complete the project due to the terrain and weather, he however, said that the government is consistently following it up. Talking about the Shillong Airport, Singh said that the hurdle was due to lack of will and very soon things will be in the right perspective.
He added that within few years, the NDA government has done away with 1500 rules and laws found to be obsolete, many of which are the legacy of the British government.