In November, the lack of sufficient human resources was identified by the Prime Minister’s Committee on the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) of India as the biggest constraint in the adoption of e-governance. The government currently employs only 5000 IT professionals, 50 per cent of whom work in a single agency.
The Expert Committee, headed by Nandan Nilekani, Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India, was formed then to recommend new policies to strengthen the position and capabilities of public sector IT employees and attract new talent from outside the government.
The need, scale and urgency of the HR requirements of the government are intensified by the expansion plans and ambitious targets of the NeGP – four massive e-governance projects are being implemented on a national scale, and a bill mandating electronic delivery of government services within five years is poised to be passed in Parliament soon.
One of the measures recommended to enhance the organisational structures to strengthen the capacity of employees is the creation of a Chief Information Office (CIO) in all government ministries, assisted by an Electronic Services Division, to provide corporate leadership for e-governance initiatives and work on convergence in policy, applications, and infrastructure across government.
The Committee also recommends the creation of e-Governance Strategic Groups in areas such as cybersecurity, shared services, and standards and interoperability within the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY). The Groups should include experts from different government departments and agencies as well as from private sector organisations in the industry, academia, and research, to tap expertise available outside the government.
The report includes provisions for training of new and old employees of the government to make them ‘eGov ready’. For example, the Committee recommends that financial resources up to 5 per cent of project cost be dedicated to training of project members. To create a talent pool of officials who can assume leadership positions, training programmes for CIOs and Project Leaders, which include exposure to national and international best practices, are recommended.
The Committee also suggests that basic ICT skills be a mandatory requirement at the entry level for all positions in government, and that incentives such as performance bonuses be offered to government officers working in the area of e‐governance.
The report was presented to Kapil Sibal, Minister for Communications and Information Technology, who advised the DeitY to initiate the process for implementing the Committee’s recommendations. The full report can be accessed here.
---
Autor(en)/Author(s): Sumedha Jalote
Quelle/Source: futureGov, 28.01.2013
Bitte besuchen Sie/Please visit:
