E-governance project services 1.2 mn citizens

The Kalyan-Dombivali Municipal Corporation (KDMC), near Mumbai, has successfully implemented an e-governance project, which has received much support from citizens. The facilities offered reach out and service around 1.2 million citizens.

Conceptualized in 1999, the project offers more than 100 public utility services including, property tax payment, new water connections, among several other bill payments, issuing of various licenses, and issuing of certificates like birth and death certificates. Most of these services are available through the Internet as well.

Harishchandra Patil, Mayor, KDMC, said, "The hallmark of the service is that on one hand it has ushered a totally transparent environment, and on the other, citizens are getting all the services at a single centralized place that adds to their convenience. The automated system has not only helped to improve the process efficiency, but the government has started collecting more revenues from various services to the citizens.

"So far, KDMC has rendered more than 65,000 services, collected more than 110,000 water and tax bills, and redressed more than 34,000 complaints. The service time has substantially reduced to just a few minutes," he added.

The Corporation has plans to bring more citizens under its fold and offer them anytime-anywhere modes of access.

The project is powered by Oracle Database and Oracle Application Server on Sun Solaris-based systems. The system integrator is Wipro Infotech and the e-governance solution provider is ABM Knowledgeware Limited.