2. The evolution of e-government in India: the early days

The genesis of ‘computerization in governance’ efforts in the Indian context can be traced to the early 1960s. It was in the 1990s, however, that the e-government discourse emerged, in parallel with the liberalization of the country’s economy, in its current form as ‘technology-mediated administrative process-restructuring to promote good governance’.19 The economic reforms adopted by the Government of India in 1991 to ward off an imminent balance of payments crisis paved the way for a shift in the vision of state-led development, by which the traditional agenda of socialist planning was replaced by that of ‘good governance for market-led growth and administrative efficiency’.20 In this transition, ICTs emerged as an important policy priority, for their twin potential for catalyzing growth, and enabling systemic reforms in governance structures.

Firstly, in the decade immediately following the economic reforms, there were a range of policy level developments focused on equipping the country transition to a knowledge economy, such as:

  1. The promotion of Foreign Direct Investment in IT and ITenabled service sectors through the establishment of Software Technology Parks and Export Enterprise Zones, and the institution of tax-holidays;21
  2. The creation of a separate, dedicated Ministry for Information Technology in 1999;22 and,
  3. The adoption of the National Telecommunication Policy 1999, which sought to “provide a balance between the provision of universal service to all uncovered areas, including the rural areas, and the provision of high-level services capable of meeting the needs of the country’s economy”,23 through the corporatization of the Department of Telecommunications by separating its policy and licensing functions from service provision functions, enhancing the competitiveness of the telecommunications sector by providing a level playing field to all players, and the establishment of a Universal Service Obligation Fund.

Secondly, there was a focus on leveraging the emerging capacities in IT and IT-enabled service sectors, for “higher efficiency, transparency, accessibility and accountability as well as reduction of procedural complexity that breeds corruption”24 within existing administrative systems, which reflected the approach of the ‘New Public Management’ paradigm to public sector reform during the 1990s.25 This manifested in developments such as:

  1. The formulation of a 12 point e-governance agenda for all Union Ministries and departments, in 2000. This agenda mainly comprised of the following aspects: the digitalization of internal procedures and housekeeping processes, employee capacitybuilding in ICT skills, and the electronic delivery of services to the public. It was sought to be operationalized through the preparation of Ministry/ department-level IT strategies for a five year period, broken down into specific action plans and targets.26
  2. The enactment of the IT Act in 2000, that provided a “legal cover” and a “boost” to e-governance through provisions such as granting legal recognition to digital signatures, electronic gazette notifications and digital records.27
  3. The launch of a series of bottom-up e-government projects, championed by district level officials who were enthused by social entrepreneurial ideas in the emerging IT sector. These projects mainly focused on setting up single window information and service delivery centres and/or grievance redress points at the community level, supported by a local connectivity solution.28

Some well-known initiatives among these, include:

  • The Gyandoot centres, Intranet-enabled community service delivery points initiated by the district administration in Dhar (Madhya Pradesh state).
  • The Lokvani centres, digitally-enabled grievance redress points set up by the district administration of Sitapur (Uttar Pradesh state) in partnership with local cybercafe owners.
  • The ‘Friends’ and ‘Twins’ single window utility bill-payment centres opened by the district administrations of Thiruvanathapuram (Kerala state) and Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh state).

Not all these initiatives were successes (as they were adversely affected by the lack of a common support infrastructure for digitalized governance), but they did manage to set the stage for the nascent e-government processes to enter into the maturation phase.

However, policymakers started realizing that to enable a speedingup of e-government development in the country:

“a programme approach would need to be adopted, which must be guided by a common vision, strategy and approach. This would have the added advantage of enabling huge savings in costs, in terms of sharing the core and support infrastructure, enable interoperability through standards etc, which would result in the citizen having a seamless view of Government.”29

Thus, the stage was set for the development of the first, systematic framework for e-government in the country — the National e-governance Plan.30

 


  1. Madon, S. (2009), E-governance for development: A Focus on Rural India, London: Palgrave MacMillan.
  2. Ibid
  3. Gupta, M.P. (2012), ‘Tracking the evolution of e-governance in India’, in Weerakody, V., Technology enabled Transformation of the Public Sector: Advances in E-government, USA: Information Science Reference (An imprint of IGI Global).
  4. Since rechristened the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology
  5. Department of Telecommunications (1999), New Telecom Policy, http://www.dot.gov.in/telecom-polices/new-telecom-policy-1999, Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  6. Das, S.R. and Chandrashekhar, R. (2008), Capacity-building for E-governance in India, http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/apcity/unpan045526.pdf, Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  7. Singh,P. (2008), Recommendations for meaningful and successful e-government in India, http://www.itforchange.net/sites/default/files/ITfC/ARCPaper_Full.pdf, Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  8. 2nd Administrative Reforms Commission (2008), Promoting e-governance: The SMART Way forward, http://arc.gov.in/11threp/ARC_11th_report.htm, Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  9. Gupta, M.P. (2012), ‘Tracking the evolution of e-governance in India’,op.cit.
  10. Singh, P. (2013), E-governance in India: Existing context and possible scope for UNDP programming over 2013-18, http://www.itforchange.net/E-governance_in_India%3A_Existing_context_and_possible_scope_for_UNDP_programing_over_2013-18 ,Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  11. 2nd Administrative Reforms Commission (2008), Promoting e-governance: The SMART Way forward,op.cit, pp 106.
  12. In Indian policy debates, the idea of e-government is closely intertwined with that of e-governance . This is because the transition to e-government has been primarily viewed as a shift to a new paradigm of governance – one in which new governance arrangements such as partnerships between traditional state agencies and private and third sector agencies, are a key strategy for overcoming inefficiencies in legacy systems.