IfG.CC - The Potsdam eGovernment Competence Center

As many as 2,300 Rajiv Citizen Centres (rural eSeva centres) will be established in the State by the Information Technology Department in the next three months. Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy gave instructions to this effect to the department while reviewing the functioning of the IT promotion and e-governance in the State on Friday.

Of the 30 CSPs opened in the current fiscal till September 18 in the three districts, 24 are operational in Gaya, four in Jehanabad and two in Nawada district. The registered society which is functioning as Business Correspondent of SBI in the state at present and also running the 30 CSPs is Society for Advancement of Village Economy (SAVE). The 30 CSPs opened in Gaya, Jehanabad and Nawada districts have 30,000 customers.

"The ePCOs will have a full-fledged information system with a PC, a webcam, a broadband link and a printer to provide a host of online services in English and Indian languages," BSNL Karnataka circle chief general manager T.S. Kuppuswamy told reporters at the e-initiative launch by state IT minister Katta Subarmanya Naidu here Monday.

All services that do not require verification of records at the Calcutta Municipal Corporation (CMC) headquarters will be delivered from the centres, being set up as part of the e-Calcutta project.

The first e-Calcutta outlet — in Business Tower, at 206 AJC Bose Road — is likely to be commissioned by March, said mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharyya. Fourteen more are in the pipeline.

CCAOI (Cyber Cafe Association of India) along with Connect9 & Airlink Wireless has taken the first step towards making this cost user friendly, affordable & reality. Understanding the requirements of the IT Act 2000 and the hardships & concerns our small businessmen face almost on daily basis, whether due to lack of knowledge or clarity.

At the meeting of the Consultative Committee on National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) here IT and Communications Minister A Raja said the SWAN Scheme has been approved at a total cost of Rs 3,334 crore.

The Villages of Khuda Jassu, Dhanas, Kaimbwala, Raipur Kalan, Raipur Khurd, Makhan Majra and Behlana have already been covered under this facility. Gram Sampark Centres in other villages including Dadu Majra, Khuda Alisher, Daria, Maloya and Kishengarh will also have a Gram Sampark Centers soon.

The centers are part of the Indian government initiative to start about 100,000 similar ones pan India.

In West Bengal, the centers will be developed by Reliance Communications, which will provide connectivity to all villages in the state.

Villagers will be facilitated for payments of telephone, electric and water supply consumer bills and with other essential services like obtaining revenue land records etc. at these centres without plying for it to district headquarter.

According to the him, over 70 per cent of the rollout has been completed in Assam, Bihar, Cha­ndigarh, Delhi, Goa, Gujarat, Hary-ana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Puducherry, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Tripura and West Bengal. In Orissa and Chhattisgarh, it has crossed the half way mark, Chandrashekhar said just before taking over as secretary, DoT, on Monday.

Director Manipur Science and Technology, UC Laishram, conveyed the above while addressing the 39th world telecommunication and information society day celebration at Kangla Hall today. The director said that there will be a CSC for each 6 villages and the CSC will be operated by interested private party. He said that the CSC will provide e-governance services to the people.

The government plans to add1,50,000 more common service centres (CSCs) to the current proposed count of 1,00,000 according to Abhishek Singh, director (e-Governance) with the department of information technology.

"The CSC roll out in states will reach 80,000 by end of April and will be complete for all 1,00,000 by June this year. The government is now thinking of having a CSC in each village. It might scale up its target CSC strength to 2,50,000," the official told GovernanceNow.

"The scheme was likely to generate over 400,000 direct jobs opportunities as well as indirect employment avenues of a like number in rural India," Cabinet Secretary K.M. Chandrasekhar told reporters after inaugurating a conference on 'Common Service Centres: The Change Agents'.

The government has issued the letter of intent in this regard.

Expressions of Interest (EoI) are invited from telecom/Internet service providers (TSPs) for provisioning of broadband connectivity of at least 256 kbps, the DIT said in a notice.

About 84,000 CSCs have already been set up, which each serve a cluster of 6-7 villages. Initially envisaged to cover one lakh villages, the project was later expanded to cover 2.5 lakh villages across India.

Of the one-lakh IT-enabled Common Services Centres (CSCs) that the Government is planning to set up by March 2010, as many as 25195 Centres have already been set up with another 10000 in the pipeline which would become operational by the end of this March. These Centres are being set up across the six-lakh villages in the country at an estimated cost of Rs 5742 crore which would be raised via PPP (Public Private Partnership) mode.

The electoral rolls are updated annually during the ‘summary revision’. Under the present scheme, while the staff attend to claims and objections received during the annual revision exercise, names of those unable to apply get left out of the e-rolls.