Shri Nandan Nilekani, Chairperson of UIDAI and Chairman of the Expert Committee on HR Policy for e-Governance, along with some Members of the Committee, presented the Report of the Committee to the Union Minister for Communication and Information Technology, Shri Kapil Sibal here yesterday.
The first meeting of the Prime Minister’s Committee on National e-Governance Plan, held on 23.11.2011, while observing that lack of qualified human resources, in sufficient numbers, is the biggest constraint in the adoption of e-Governance, had approved the preparation of an HR Policy for taking NeGP forward. Pursuant to the decision of the PM’s Committee, an Expert Committee was constituted under the Chairmanship of Shri Nandan Nilekani, Chairperson, UIDAI to recommend the HR framework and policy for e-Governance, which would address the need for harnessing talent from the government as well as from the open market. The Committee included senior officials from different Ministries of the Government of India, representatives from the State Government, NASSCOM and other experts.
The Committee had extensive deliberations including consultations with stakeholders from Government and industry and studied best practices. Based on this, the Committee has a made a number of wide ranging recommendations which, it is expected, would facilitate the setting up of appropriate HR structures and mechanisms for e-Governance and fast track the successful implementation of the NeGP, contributing to the realisation of good governance in the country.
Some of the important recommendations relate to putting in place appropriate organizational structures both at the Centre& States for programme and project management of e-Governance. The Committee, among its various recommendations, has proposed putting in place Electronic Services Division headed by Chief Information Officer (CIO) in Central Ministries, Electronic Delivery of Services (EDS) Directorate in States/UTs and Dedicated Project Teams for managing projects. The enhancement of NIC’s role as a Technology Advisor to the Government and its strategic role in DeitY, Line Ministries & States has also been emphasized. The Committee has suggested various policy interventions that are required to build internal competencies and growing the internal resource pool in the Government with institutionalized training and capacity building mechanisms. The Committee has recommended that competencies outside the Government ought to be leveraged and an enabling framework for attracting, retaining & optimally utilizing such skilled persons needs to be put in place.
Shri Sibal thanked Shri Nilekani and the Members of the Committee for the efforts put in by them in making wideranging recommendations that would address a very crucial need for the successful implementation of e-Governance in the Country, which had also engaged the attention of the Prime Minister. He observed that e-Governance with its attendant benefits accruing to the citizens, has become an effective tool for the transformation of governance and lack of human resources with required competencies has been the constraining factor for successful implementation of e-Gov projects. He advised the Department of Electronics and Information Technology to immediately initiate the process for implementing the recommendations.