Highlighting the role of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in the Passport Seva Programme, Golok Kumar Simli, Chief Technology Officer – Passport Seva Programme, Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, said, “With ICT, we mean innovation, collaboration, the transfer of knowledge and of connected intelligence. This is what I have done in the Passport Seva Programme.”
Explaining further, he said that when it comes to collaboration, it is about all the stakeholders and dependencies. Giving examples to that, Simli said, “The police authorities, India Post who dispatch the passport, India Security Press Nashik who brings our blank booklet are the major dependencies.”
He talked about the time when the services were being made online. “We kept in mind the difficulties faced by people living in remote places. At that time, we had 45,000-50,000 Common Service Centres (CSCs) across India. We were the first ones to integrate with all those common CSC’s, creating ecosystems for those kinds of sections of society who were not having computer and internet access at home.”
“This gave us a platform and digital infrastructure to reach to everyone across the country,” he added.
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Simli said that transforming public service delivery at large, without making any differentiation between remote and urban or any other kind, is how you can give a seamless and hassle-free service.
Talking about digital adoption, he concluded by saying, “We are not only adopting and leveraging but we are also trying to innovate and improve in all facets of the service delivery ecosystem, be it citizen interface, employees, users, or stakeholders.”
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