Odisha to spend 2% of Plan Budget on e-governance

The Odisha government has made a resolution to spend two per cent of the Annual Plan budget of various departments for providing services to the citizens on the electronic platform.

"With the intention to utilize e-governance as a tool for bringing better transparency, responsiveness and accountability in governance, the government, after careful consideration, has decided that all government departments will earmark two per cent of their Annual Plan budget or one per cent of their overall budget (whichever is higher) for IT spending so as to provide services through the electronic mode", stated an IT department resolution. The decision to earmark funds is in line with the promise made in the state ICT (Information and Communication Technology) policy-2014. The policy says that the state government will introduce e-governance in every department so that the citizens will avail most of the government services locally without any hitches.

Sources said, the total spending by the government departments for providing public services on electronic platform would be around Rs 800 crore annually.

As per the resolution, the departments are needed to publish their annual e-governance action plan, monthly e­ transactions and milestones containing details of investment planned in the IT infrastructure, application development, business process re-engineering, capacity building of the personnel at different levels that would make the department's e-governance initiatives sustainable.