While presenting his Budget 2013 speech, the Finance Minister, P Chidambaram, made very pertinent points about the need for ‘inclusive growth’. The budget has, to a large extent, focused on higher growth and financial inclusion. In fact, e-Governance is all about bringing financial inclusion and enabling different sectors in the country to grow at a healthy rate.
Case in point is the MCA 21 programme from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Government of India. A Mission Mode Programme under the National -Governance Project, the MCA 21, is enabling the Ministry of Corporate Affairs to provide efficient services to lakhs of corporate entities. Another good example of an e-Governance project that has led to vast benefits to the nation is the Passport Seva Kendras project. In the current issue of eGov, we have interviews from two leading officials from the Ministry of External Affairs. The interviews shed light on the various ways by which it has become possible to provide passports in a timely, transparent, more accessible and reliable manner.
The current issue of eGov is taking a broad overview of the e-Governance implementations from Odisha. We have interacted with a range of officials from the State to gain an insight on the major achievements and also the challenges in the areas of e-Governance. A lot of work is being done in the State, especially in the areas of education and healthcare, to facilitate the creation of a financially
inclusive society.
The next theme that we have in this issue is that of security. As e-Governance systems are online, security is an important area of concern. We have interview of Dr. Gulshan Rai, who is the man at the centre of the effort to develop a comprehensive security framework for the nation. In the interview, Dr. Gulshan Rai has said, “Cyber security is an endless journey.” This is undeniably true. The cyber security systems have to keep evolving with the new technology in order to be effective.
On 6th March, 2013 we are having the eOdisha Summit at Hotel Swosti Premium, Bhubaneswar. And on 8th March we have the SecureIT 2013 at The Oberoi, New Delhi. Both are national level events in e-Governance. Many important officials from major government departments from the Centre and States will be participating. We look forward to seeing you at both the events. After all, it is very essential that all sections of society participate in the discussions on the ways by which we can broaden the scope of e-Governance and security in the country.
