Technology Sabha 2008

Suwidha in Punjab

Prabhjeet Singh Kukreja, Project Manager- e-Governance, Department of IT, Government of Punjab

The final session for the Technology Sabha was a presentation on Suwidha (Single User-friendly WIndow Disposal Help line for Applicants) which is implemented in Punjab. To present the information about Suwidha, Prabhjeet Singh Kukreja, Project Manager- e-Governance, Department of IT, government of Punjab was present. The objective of this project which is about taking IT to rural areas is to to facilitate citizens by capturing inputs at a single point, defining a specified delivery date depending upon the type of service, accepting cash at the counter itself and delivery of final document. This project has been able to give fast, convenient and corruption-free delivery of services to citizens. It has been implemented successfully in all the districts and most of the Sub-Divisional offices of Punjab.

Suwidha provides more than 33 services to citizens which includes services such as registration of marriages, arms license, ration card, issuance of passport, driving license , registration of vehicles, collection of application for old age pension, SC / BC / OBC certificates and birth & death certificates.

As part of technology, Suwidha has been implemented on the Local Area Network (LAN) at each location. In addition to this, all LANs will be connected to the central server using SWAN (state wide area network) at the state headquarters for MIS (Management Information System). For citizen comfort, Web services have been started for Suwidha in a limited way and mobile services at a few locations have been started. Two districts, Patiala and Jalandhar have been selected for the implementation of Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) which would further cut down the time needed for the delivery of services. Suwidha has even made use of encryption and biometrics for security.

Talking about how Suwidha is different, Kukreja said, “It was rated as the topmost project among all the premier e-governance projects in the country in the e-governance report card of 2005 and has now been selected by GOI to professionally document this project for the use of other states.” It has centralized control with decentralized implementation and can be easily integrated with Common Service Centers /Village Knowledge Centers Projects. This project further serves Citizen, Punjab State e-Governance Society (PSEGS), District Level e-Governance Societies, National Informatics Center, and Punjab State Center.