Srinagar, Nov 27: The government established Information Technology (IT) department some five years ago to facilitate implementation of e-Governance in the state, and spent Rs 5 crore on the computerization in the Civil Secretariat. But due to lack of recruitment policy no appointments were made till now, even the director’s chair is empty letting the multi-crore initial investments go in vain.
e-genesis
The initiative for the e-governance had come in 1998 during the regime of former Chief Minister Dr Farooq Abdullah when the government vide order 614-GAD created Information Technology Unit.
Officials say for some unknown reasons the unit was transferred to CM’s Secretariat vide order No 885 GAD dated 15-7-1998. The unit was directed to function under the control of Principal Secretary to the CM.
And finally in 2002 vide a Cabinet Decision the IT department was formally created as a full-fledged administrative unit.
Secretariat’s General Administration Department (GAD) was asked to provide administrative staff for the new department.
As a makeshift arrangement handful of 17 odd resource persons from departments like Power development Department, Forest, Finance and Education were brought on deputation to work in the IT department, till fresh recruitment would be made.
“Field of computers being new, the fresh appointments required massive planning on administrative, financial and technical fronts. Over 120 technical posts were to be created for which a proper policy was to be framed,” said an official.
But even though half a decade has passed, the authorities are yet to finalize policy for the creation of posts and the recruitment.
Officials say since inception only the Director’s post was created while it was decided that the other vacancies would be filled from time to time on temporary basis.
Ironically, even the Director’s post is vacant due to delay in the policy framing.
“IT department is literally headless since its inception and functions without any technical head. How good can a department work in the absence of head and efficient staff?” they argued.
Blame-game
To overcome the crisis, officials in IT department say this year they had submitted a recruitment policy before the Planning department. The proposal was rejected.
Sources said the Planning department had raised queries over the formulation of the proposal.
“Framing of recruitment rules is not a one man’s show that a handful of officials from a particular department will come up with finalities. It has to be a decision of a broad based committee comprising of members from GAD, Law and some technical experts,” said an official.
“In fact,” he said, “the e-governance will never flourish in the state unless the government holds an inquiry into the huge investments made by the previous governments in the name of IT.”
“By taking a decision to promote e-governance we may unwittingly cover up the misdeeds of the previous regimes. So better wait and watch the internal bickering and politics in the government,” a top official pleading anonymity said.
Bottom-line
The state had procured hardware and software for computerization at the cost of Rs 5 crores. Of this few million were spent on development of the software through Tata Consultancy. Some amount was spent on the networking while the rest on hardware.
“But the e-governance never picked up because the investment was a hasty decision for reasons better known to the then government,” said a senior official in the IT department.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): M Hyderi
Quelle/Source: GreaterKashmir, 28.11.2007
