Government of Delhi : Government Departments

IT Policy

A.. VISION	The rapid advancements in the field of Information, Communication and Entertainment Technologies and the resultant explosive growth of the information intensive services sector have radically changed the world economic landscape. These changes have given rise to a new society based on knowledge. This has further resulted in the new avenues of development, employment, productivity, efficiency, and enhanced factors of economic growth. Government of Delhi recognises the enormous potential of the IT and has decided to embark upon an ambitious journey to herald the benefits of IT to the people of the state. It envisions that by the year 2003, Delhi shall have realised this huge potential and, as a result, would emerge as a premier cyber state in the country with its citizens qualifying to be e-citizens.
B. ASPIRATIONS	The aspirations of the IT policy in the state of Delhi are governed by the following 6 E’s i.e. Electronic Governance, Equality, Education, Employment, Entrepreneurship and Economy. The objectives of the policy are as follows. E-Governance : To use e-governance as a tool and deliver a government that is more pro-active and responsive to its citizens. Equality : To use the power of the IT to achieve the objectives of eradicating poverty, improving healthcare, empowering women and economically weaker sections of the society. The Right to Information Act that the government of Delhi proposes to enact will empower the people and ultimately help to bring about social and economic justice. Education : To encourage the use of IT in schools, colleges and educational institutions in the state of Delhi so as to enable the students to improve their skills, knowledge and job prospects and enable them to obtain employment in this sunrise industry. Employment : To use IT for generating additional employment for the new digital economy. To facilitate localisation of software, so that benefits of IT could percolate not only in English language, but also in Hindi, Urdu, and Punjabi. Entrepreneurship : To unleash the Delhi incubation engine, promote entrepreneurship, earn foreign exchange, and increase IT’s contribution to the economic growth of the state. Economy : To encourage and accelerate investments and growth in IT hardware, software, Internet, training, IT enabled services, telecom, e-commerce and related sectors in the state. To use IT effectively in industries to make them competitive and web-enabled. To provide adequate infrastructure in the state so that IT sector can flourish. To use IT for ushering world-class e-tourism in the state.
C. ENABLERS	While it is essential to announce an IT policy for the State of Delhi, it is equally important to put together an enabling process for its implementation. For this, we propose to put two processes in place. A high-powered committee under the Chairpersonship of the Chief Minister and formation of core-groups for implementing the policies of the government in respect of E-Commerce, IT enabled services, E-governance and E-Education.
*Advisory Council*	Advisory Council : The government shall set up high-powered Information Technology Advisory Council under the Chairpersonship of Chief Minister of Delhi. This advisory Council would have representative from the industry, government and academia. This Council will review the implementation of the IT policy and also advise the state on further improvements as may be required from time to time so that Delhi continues to keep pace with the global IT scenario.
*Core Groups*	Core Groups : To oversee the implementation of the policy in key areas of Information Technology such as E-Commerce, IT enabled services, E-Governance and E-Education, as also to assist the Advisory Council, the government shall set up Core Groups for each of these key areas, which shall have representatives from the industry, government and academia.
Department of Information Technology to be strengthened	Strengthening of the Department of Information Technology: The Department of Information Technology will be suitably strengthened to enable it to discharge its role of acting as a single window agency for an all-round implementation and monitoring of the state IT policy.
*Milestones*	Milestones on the road map to cyber city : While Govt. of Delhi is committed to achieve its objective of transforming Delhi into a premier cyber city by the year 2003, the government realises that it is equally essential to set up important milestones on this journey. These milestones will allow the government to take stock of what has been achieved, what hurdles need to be removed, and whether any mid-course correction is required to reach the destination. These milestones are December 2000, June 2001 and December 2001. At appropriate places this policy document will enumerate the objectives, which the departments are expected to achieve by these dates.
STRATEGY	The private sector has been in the forefront of developments of IT sector. As the government seeks to translate its vision into reality, it expects the private sector to continue to play its pivotal role. However, the vision will not be realised early without the government playing an active role in the following three areas. Promoting IT for masses. Ushering E-Governance. Creating an atmosphere conducive for the growth of IT Industry & IT Infrastructure.
IT to improve the quality of life	PROMOTING IT FOR MASSES The two strategies – promoting the IT sector and infrastructure and promoting e-governance – will bring enormous benefits of IT to the citizens of Delhi. While the government will take a number of pro-active steps to promote the growth of IT industry and e-governance, it is equally conscious that these developments do not create new division in society – referred to as digital divide by some people – divide between those who have access to IT based industry and those who do not. Government is therefore determined to see that the benefits of Information Technology do not remain confined to higher classes of society. In fact government intends to use IT as a major instrument to provide new opportunities to those segments of society who do not see opportunities to improve their quality of life and tend to reconcile to their fate.
*Bridging gap between haves and have-nots*	It is the firm view of the government that if any technology can create new opportunities to bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots in society in the present times, it is IT.
*Enabling Process*	To give a concrete shape to this thinking, the government shall take the following catalytic, pro-active and enabling steps. Enabling Literacy and Education for the masses Fulfilling local information needs of the people Educating citizens about their duties Enabling e-tourism Enabling women
*Spreading literacy and education*	i. Enabling Literacy and Education for the masses Information Technology with convergence of various technologies related to communication and delivery of information such as video, audio, telephone, television, newspapers, computers etc. into one unified network, provides for the first time a unique opportunity to spread literacy and education on a mass scale at affordable costs. The convergence enables ease of providing educational material, which is one of the pre-requisites to spread literacy and education. The government proposes to spread literacy and computer education by initiating action under the following broad policy framework.
"Teach the Teachers" Programme	The government shall start a "Teach the Teachers" programme for upgrading the IT knowledge and skills of teachers on a regular basis. A Special Cell will be set up in State Council for Education, Research and Training to work out details of this programme. The government intends to take up training of at least 10% of teachers in Higher Secondary Schools during 2000-01. There shall be an incentive scheme to attract teachers to this programme and to encourage them to complete it successfully.
Computer Labs	The government will establish computer laboratories in all government schools by the year 2003 in collaboration with private sector. About 115 schools will be covered in the first year i.e. 2000-2001. The Government will also encourage aided schools to set up computer labs in collaboration with private sector.
*Computer Literacy campaign in slums*	The government will launch a literacy campaign in slum areas using ICT. It proposes to start a pilot project in a slum colony under which 30 computer kiosks will be set up with Internet connectivity to enable the children to learn computing skills on their own without any adult intervention.
*Upgrading ITIs*	The government shall upgrade Industrial Training Institutes for providing training of skills for data entry, marketing, transcription, call centres, content creation and data processing. This will give necessary boost to the IT enabled services in the state.
*Training Centre for unemployed*	The government will encourage private sector initiatives in setting up Training Centres for the Unemployed Educated Youths. The government aims to start at least 10 Centres in the year 2000-01.
*IT Open University*	The government will take steps to establish an IT Open University. It will also encourage technical courses in its university, schools and ITI’s. The government hopes to take education and literacy to a much larger section of population in the next three years.
*Setting up an IIIT*	The government will also set up a premier Indian Institute of Information Technology to impart high quality IT education and training to the people.
*Digital Library*	It will also set up a Digital Media Library that would be a central storehouse of digitalised data containing government records, industry information and information on education, tourism and archaeology.
	ii) Fulfilling local information needs of the people.
*Citizen Service Points*	b) The government has also proposed to set up Suwidha Points at each of its major offices. These Suwidha Points will be single user-friendly window for deadline-based handling of applications. At this point a citizen will also be given an acknowledgement with a probable date of response to his application.
*Suwidha Points*	a) The government has already proposed setting up of Citizen Service Points all over the state, which could be used by the citizens to access any information about government services from any location within the state and outside. These CSPs will be electronically linked to government departments through their websites. These will be set up by the private sector that will be allowed to recover the costs by charging the user an affordable transaction fee.
Cyber Cafes and Information Kiosks	c) In addition the government will encourage the private individuals to set up information kiosks all over the city. The kiosks shall provide free access to a wide range of citizen-oriented information. In particular, all the e-governance related information should be available through these kiosks. They need not have Internet connections. They could simply have data stored for access to the citizens. These kiosks will be encouraged to use touch-screens requiring no use of either the keyboard or the mouse. The government will assist the entrepreneurs in getting space where demand for kiosks could be foreseen. Some examples of such places are bus stops, markets, colleges, community centres, resident association offices, clubs, tourist places, airports, railway stations and schools. In addition the government will encourage the owners of STD / ISD booths to convert them to cyber cafes all over Delhi.
	iii) Educating citizens about their duties Internet based information delivery systems in combination with conventional broadcast media, TV and Radio, could act as a major vehicle to educate citizens regarding their duties to the nation and the state. This will immensely help in people’s participation in programme like family welfare, conservation of environment, and preservation of ethical, moral and cultural values. The people could also be informed about the rich heritage of the capital and the need to preserve the ancient monuments which dot the city landscape and the dangers of vandalising them. The nuisance created by littering public places, parks, roads and places of religious and tourist interests will be highlighted using IT technology. Enabling E-Tourism a) Tourism is one industry that can effectively use IT to promote itself. The use of internet for promoting tourism is only one example. b) Innovative solutions using IT can help Delhi to attract more visitors and tourists by providing them with information about the many places of historical interest in the city. c) To take advantage of IT in the tourism sector the government would encourage and initiate the following
Tourism Portal	E-Tourism Portal: There are currently many web sites providing information about the tourism sector of the state. However, there is a need for setting up comprehensive tourism portal for the state of Delhi. This portal could have comprehensive information on the tourism industry, hotels, places of religious and historical interest etc. The idea is to not only provide basic information but also cybercasting, video clips, and graphics etc. The portal will have cybercasting of major events in the State of Delhi. The portal will also encourage e-commerce by selling local handicrafts, agriculture and industry products through the web site. The portal will also have a revenue model of earning through on-line bookings, advertisements and brokerage from e-commerce transactions.
Tourism Marketing	Marketing : An aggressive marketing plan would be designed to market the state of Delhi through the net.
	Enabling Women a) Empowerment of women is an integral part of the process of development of any economy. The transition to a knowledge-based economy includes the participation of all sectors of the society. b) The government of Delhi considers the role of women to be very important in the economic and social development. With the increased emphasis in IT by the government, there is a need to introduce special scheme for providing the benefits of IT to the women in the state. c) The IT can play a catalytic role in the process of empowering women. Government will take the following initiatives in this regard.
*Literacy campaign for women*	An IT literacy programme specially directed towards spreading literacy among women would be launched by the year 2001
*Setting up web sites*	Government will encourage NGOs to set up B2C (business to consumer) and B2B (business to business) websites to promote interest of women doing business in the state.
*Re-inventing Govt. Processes*	USHERING E-GOVERNANCE I. Citizen interface Government of Delhi will use IT not merely to automate its existing procedures but also to reinvent government processes and to redefine the role of bureaucracy. This would enable the government to make its functioning citizen-centric, transparent and efficient.
Nine Departments to go "on-line"	The government has identified nine major public dealing departments that will go ‘on-line’ by the year 2002. These departments are revenue, transport, sales tax, excise, education, social welfare, co-operatives, health and labour. Of these sales tax, excise and transport will go on-line by June 2001. The government will provide assistance for computerisation of Local and Autonomous Bodies such as MCD, NDMC, DVB, DJB etc. working under it.
Govt. transaction through Internet	In order to this, the government will set up the legal machinery to implement cyber law provisions regarding recognition of digital signature and electronic records and their use in government. By December 2003, it shall enable the citizens to conduct most of their transactions with the government through the Internet. Some examples of these transactions are: obtaining driving licenses, registration of vehicles, registration with employment exchanges, registration of births and deaths, obtaining ration cards, payment of various bills, lodging of various complaints and their redressal, delivery of pensions, tendering, filing of tax returns and applying for admissions. To ensure that this process is monitored periodically some important milestones have been fixed.
Heads of Departments and the OSDs	The heads of department shall be responsible for the preparation and implementation of their respective departmental action plans. An Officer on Special Duty will assist each head of department in this task. He will also act as the nodal officer in the department for implementing IT policy. The heads of departments shall allocate 3% of their departments’ budget for implementation of this policy.
Employee support	In addition, a detailed plan for employee training shall be implemented. The Civil Service Training Institute shall design new modules for IT courses for imparting computer training and education to produce knowledge workers in the government. The annual confidential reports of the employees shall reflect the employee performance in implementation of this policy. The possibility of relaxing the scheme for loan to employees for purchase of computers and peripherals shall be explored. For all new employees appropriate level of computer literacy shall be made an essential requirement in the recruitment rules.
Information through Internet	Milestone One: December 2000 By the end of December 2000, the citizens will be able to access information relating to transactions with the government through the Internet. Some examples of such information are: downloading of non-priced forms, information about eligibility, rules, documents required to be submitted along with various application forms, formats of affidavits, and information relating to tenders. The filing of complaints of suggestions through the Internet will also be made possible. Simultaneously, the government will also put on the internet information that ought to be in public domain. This will enable the citizens to play the role of a watchdog and to ensure transparency. Some examples of this type of information are: land owned by the government and the gaon sabha, details relating to the civil works and payments made for them, mandi market prices, availability of hospital beds, citizens’ charters, cause list of various revenue courts, names of licensees under different provisions of law and the terms and conditions thereof
Right to Information Act	Later this information set will be further expanded and their placement in public domain will be made legally enforceable through the Right to Information Act
Citizen Service Points	Milestone Two: June 2001 By this date some transactions with the government will be carried using telephones, stored-value credit or debit cards. This will be achieved through the intermediation of the banks. Paying bills for government services is one example. IT will make travel to the government offices unnecessary. The citizen will be able to transact business with a few major public-dealing departments from one place. These points – Citizen Service Points (CSPs) – will be electronically linked to these departments. These Points will be set up in private sector that will recover its initial cost of setting up these Points by charging the citizens a transaction fee.
Suwidha Points	Besides these CSPs, the government will set up Suwidha Points in each department to enable the citizens to interact at only a single point called the Suwidha or single user-friendly window for handling applications which have to be submitted by a certain date. At these Suwidha Points the applications will be accepted and acknowledged and the citizens will be given a date by which they may expect a response from the department. The government proposes to allot these Suwidha Points to senior citizens who will be allowed to charge handling costs.
Self Certification exemption for IT Industry	By this date the department will explore the possibility of introducing self-certification/exemption for IT software industry under various Acts/Regulations mentioned in para D (a) (viii) above.
Use of Smart E-cards	Milestone Three: December 2001 The third milestone will be reached when citizens will be able to use electronic cards for accessing services offered by different departments. The government will consider issuing multi-purpose cards to citizens that would serve the purpose of being a ration card, an identity card, a driving license etc. The citizens will be required to register their personal details only once. To begin with, ration cards and a single electronic card in selected areas on an experimental basis will replace driving licenses by June 2001.
RACE TO THE FINISHING LINE	1. Similar milestones will be identified for the between December 2001 to March 2003 in detailed departmental plans in such a manner that the goal of transacting business over the internet is achieved.
Improving internal efficiency	II. A more efficient government IT will also be deployed to improve government’s internal efficiency. This will be done in two main areas: in internal communication and in data handling.
Use of E-mail, Bulletin Boards and Video Conferencing	Internal communication will be improved by increasing use of e-mail, bulletin boards and video conferencing in the government. Routine circulars, meeting notices, and minutes will be communicated through e-mail. Video-conferencing will be used to decide urgent matters in consultation with senior officers without calling them over from their offices. This will make them accessible to the people even while being in a position to confer with other officers in matters which are urgent and cannot wait for a formal meeting to be convened
Data Handling	Data handling comprises data capture, data sharing, data storage, and data retrieval, data processing and data presentation. Some examples of the projects which lend themselves to data handling are Executive Information Systems for the departmental heads, computerisation of land records and hospital OPDs, ICT based delivery of education in formal, informal and non-formal sectors of education, data capture on violation of laws/rules using remote cameras or other recorders with online data updation and generation of reports in such areas as traffic violation and pollution monitoring. These projects with their target dates of completion shall be detailed in departmental plans of action. The expected progress at the milestones identified earlier i.e. December 2000, June 2001 and December 2001 are stated below.
*Routine Communications*	Milestone One: December 2000 By December 2000, all routine communication between CM’s Office and departments and among departments themselves shall be done through e-mail and bulletin boards. A beginning in the use of video conferencing will be made by that date.
*Networking Departments*	Milestone Two: June 2001 The next milestone will be reached in June 2001. By this date all the departments shall be internally networked and projects of all departments will be under implementation.
*Land Records Computerisation*	Milestone Three: December 2001 By December 2001 some important projects would have been completed. These include networking of different departments, the departmental Executive Information Systems and the Land Record Computerisation.
*Task Force*	III. Implementation enabling mechanism. A mechanism to ensure that these milestones are reached is necessary. This is specially so because at the time of implementation many complex technical, legal, financial and institutional problems will arise. Some of these will be related to the need for process change and culture change. The government will, therefore, constitute a Task Force headed by the Chief Secretary to implement this policy. It will lay down uniform guidelines for the departments to follow so that common issues are not handled differently by different departments. A technical committee comprising representatives from IT industry and academia will assist the task force. The Task Force’s first main responsibility will be to ensure that all the major public departments prepare their respective plans to implement this policy.
Incubation Centre	Creating an atmosphere conducive for the growth of IT Industry & IT Infrastructure. The state government will set up an "Incubation Centre" that will guide entrepreneurs to make business plans, advise on mergers and acquisitions and network with venture capital companies including the Venture Capital Fund Company to be created by the government of Delhi. The Centre will undertake financing of small IT companies.
*Zero Sales Tax on IT Software and Hardware*	The government is in favour of zero sales tax on the transactions of the following IT related hardware and software. Sale and leasing of computers and its accessories. Inter-state sales of computers, parts, accessories and computer consumables. CD-ROMS, optical disc media or magnetic media containing text, data, or multimedia. However in keeping with the ruling of a uniform sales tax in all states, the government shall fix the sales tax on hardware and software not above the agreed Uniform Floor Rate (UFR). The state government would however lobby for zero sales tax on all IT products along with other states and central government.
IT Industries in residential localities	The state government shall strongly recommend to the Govt. of India to permit software and service units to function in residential areas subject to such reasonable restrictions as may be imposed by the government in public interest.
IT Software & service industry entitle to Industry status	All IT software and service industries including Services and Training Institutions in IT will be entitled to "Industry" status. Such units shall be eligible for all concessions and incentives applicable to Industries. For the purpose of this clause, accredited Training Institutions will also be eligible to claim industry status subject to certain norms which will enable them to obtain Term Loans and Bank Finance at industry rates.
Exemption from Routine inspection for IT industry and facility for self certification	IT Software and IT services companies, being constituents of the knowledge industry, shall be exempted from routine inspection by inspectors like those for Factory, Boiler, Labour, Pollution, Environment, Industry in line with the approved policy of Government of India. Moreover, the State Government agrees in principle to self- certification/exemption as far as possible for the IT software Industry from the provisions of the following Acts/ Regulations. Factories Act; Employment Exchange (Compulsory Notification of Vacancies) Act; Payment of Wages Act; Minimum of wages Act; Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act; Workmen Compensation Act; Shops and Establishments Act; and Employees State Insurance Act.
Permission for three shift operation	General permission is accorded, subject to such orders issued by the Police Commissioner of Delhi as may be necessary from time to time in public interest, to run a three-shift operation to the IT software and Services industry.
ROW Clearance	The government shall assist in getting speedy clearance for Right of Way and use of infrastructure of utilities like DVB.
Protection of IPR	The government shall set up a regulatory framework to implement cyber laws. The intellectual property rights of creator of content and software shall be protected through vigorous enforcement of relevant copyright laws.
IT Parks	The government will establish modern IT parks in collaboration with private sector. The park will have high speed telecom facility and plug and play built up modules for minimising gestation period of new projects. The first such park will be established by the year 2002
International Gateway	The government will encourage private companies to set up international gateway for providing high-speed Internet connectivity.
Campaign for E-Commerce	A massive campaign will be launched to encourage e-commerce and computerisation in the local industries. It shall attempt to increase e-commerce activities by at least three times in the next two years. A suitable framework to encourage and support electronic money transfer, electronic benefited transfers (EBT cards) and electronic tagging like bar coding will be established.
IT for Industries	The government will initiate an "IT for industries" project. Under this project, advice will be given to the local industries to adopt use of IT or to diversify into IT activities.
IT Enabled Services	IT enabled services like Medical Transcription, Call Centres, Data Processing, Back-Office Operations, GIS, Revenue Accounting etc. are considered as niche areas for the state. A special scheme will be announced to help local industries to diversify into IT enabled services. The benefits of the scheme would also be applicable for companies setting up IT enabled services in the State.
Seminars and Workshops	The government will encourage conduct of seminars/workshops to disseminate information of IT to local industries and thus work towards increase in usage of IT in local industries.
Establishment of regional hub	With an extremely widespread telecommunication system, the state of Delhi can take lead in establishing and serving a regional hub for Internet, E-commerce and digital services traffic
State Level Awards	State level awards will be given to IT companies with outstanding performance in exports and in domestic segments.