Gist of Yojana July 2019 Issue: Citizen Centric e-Services

1. Introduction
2. Empowering Citizens Through e-Services
3. Tracking Schemes Through GIS
4. Digital Infrastructure: Core of Governance
5. Digital Empowerment through ‘Maximum Governance, Minimum Government
6. Less Cash India: Vision To Reality
7. Leveraging Technology for Transforming Education
8. e-Services for the Differently Abled
9. ICT Enabled Farm Centric Agriculture Services
10. Empowering the Marginalized Through Digital Platforms
11. Towards A National Digital Health Ecosystem/span>

Indian history is replete with instances of Governments who were extremely conscious of their duty to provide services to their citizens. Continuous efforts were made by them to set up systems of good governance through various schemes and laws. These systems were however largely based on records, files and transactions which were generally physical. It has been only in recent years that the concept of citizen centric e-Services has come to the fore.

Citizen centric e-services aim to digitally empower the society and transform the economy. They aim to restyle how citizens avail services and participate in the economy using less cash, opt for UPI, internet banking, direct benefit transfer, digital payment platform etc., using unique identification techniques, like Aadhaar, so as to drive financial inclusion with minimum lapses and delays. Government’s push towards a Paper-less, Presence-less and Cashless model of e-governance and the launch of Aadhaar, UPI and BHIM have transformed the economy. Banking is fast moving from branch banking to a virtual world of banking called Digital Banking.

Various new citizen centric and transformational digital platforms that have been developed include BHIM-UPI, e-NAM, GSTN, GigiLocker, GeM, e-Hospital, MyGov, UMANG, SWAYAM, Jeevan Pramaan, NSP etc. These efforts are heavily dependent upon the efficient use of technology and as a result, technology is increasingly being used to transform learning, economy and citizen centric service delivery mechanisms. The reach of mobile network, electricity, internet is expanding its reach to remote areas, thereby ensuring that the marginalised sections of the society are also brought into the mainstream. This digital transformation is facilitating the ease of access for citizens with disabilities as well and empowering them to access various products and services despite mobility constraints.

In the field of education too, technology is playing a greater role than ever before and is transforming classrooms from being isolated units of learning to more collaborative and communicative spaces with digital pedagogies, critical enquiry and demographic spaces that go beyond geographical constraints. Likewise, to minimise farmers’ distress, digitalising of farming systems and creating a database is also a step towards achieving sustainable agricultural production.

Citizen centric e-services focus on accessibility, quality, efficiency, affordability, delivery, mobility and user experience. Products and services can no longer be viewed in isolation from large evolving scenarios around us and there should be a healthy mix of technology with progressive policies and practices.

The Digital India Programme was launched in 2015 for ensuring digital access, digital inclusion, bridging the digital divide and digital empowerment. It is leading to India’s transformation in to a knowledge based economy and digitally empowered society. It has ensured citizen participation and empowerment with the technology that is sustainable. India is among the top countries that have digital adoption momentum. Presently, digital transformation of India is on an exponential growth path and aiming towards a trillion dollar digital economy by 2025. Government is taking strategic steps to realize the trillion Dollar digital economy potential.

Steps Taken by the Government for realising the Trillion-Dollar Economy Potential are:

• Aadhaar has provided a cradle to grave digital identity. Aadhaar enabled Digi Locker is enabling paperless governance by providing public documents to citizens digitally and facilitating consent- based data sharing for availing services. Aadhaar Enabled payment system (AEPS) facilitates banking services and digital payment. Aadhaar is the largest de-duplication mechanism for government schemes in the country.
• Jan Dhan Yojana has provided financial inclusion to unbanked people and thereby, it has enabled banking, pension (PMSBY and PMJJBY) and insurance (Atal Pension Yojana) services to common citizens. Mobile has also accelerated the accessibility of government services in rural hinterland.
• Digital delivery of services has been strengthend with the help of Common Services Centres (CACs). It provides digital access to over 350 services especially in rural areas at an affordable cost.
• CSCs have also undertaken Stree Swabhiman initiative to create awareness about menstrual health and have set up over 204 sanitary pad units.
• Digital India has resulted into a remarkable shift from project based approach to platform based approach.

 

Citizen Centric initiatives of Digital India Programme:

Direct Benefit Transfer:

• Enables transfer of government benefits directly to the bank account of beneficiaries.

DIGI Locker:

• Enables paperless governance by providing private space on public cloud to citizens for storing their public and private documents.

UMANG:

• Provides one mobile app for availing government services through backend integration with several government applications and

E-HOSPITAL:

• Facilitates automation in hospitals through 20+modules of Hospitals Management Information System, namely patient registration, IPD Pharmacy, Blood bank,

SWAYAM:

• A massive online open courses (MOOCs)
• It offers more than 2000+progeramme Allows credits to students on the completion of course. The credit is recognized by Universities.

National Scholarship Portal:

• Provides facility of multiple scholarship schemes through a single online portal and includes application submission from students, verification by School Administration, approval by authorities and disbursal through
• 20 scholarship schemes stand

PMGDISHA:

• Padhan Mantri Gramin Digital Saksharta Abhiyan has been started with an aim to make at least one persons per family digitally literate.
• Target is to train 6 crore persons in rural

GeM:

• An ecommerce platform for public procurement of common use goods and

Digital Payment:

• Many innovative digital payment tools, namely BHIM-UPI, BHIM-Aadhaar, BHARAT QR Code, National Electronic Toll Collection etc., have been implemented

Courts Mission Mode Project:

• Promotes automation in Courts including Supreme Court, High Court, District Courts Complexes
• Several services like case status. Cause list, court order, caveat search,
• National Judicial Data Grid is also implemented which analyses the data gathered from all integrated courts and shows all India figures through

 

My Gov:

• Facilitates participatory governance in the country by providing a common digital platform where citizens can share their views on government programmes and schemes.

 

Digital India Program:

• Under the Digital India programme, India has witnessed a steep growth in mobile manufacturing units. From just 2 units of mobile phones manufacturing in 2014, 268 units of mobile phone and accessories are now operational in India.
• Digital India is getting restructured and revamped to raise its bar and in this direction, several new and innovative schemes have been planned.
• Some of the major planned initiatives are India Enterprise Architecture (IndEA), National Programme on Artificial Intelligence, open API platform, On Click consent driven address change in all public databases, Meity Startup Hub and GIS based decision support system for Districts, etc.,
• IndEA aims to offer one government experience by establishing the best-in-class architectural governance, processes and practices with optional utilization of ICT infrastructure and applications.
• A National Software Product Mission is planned to implement National policy on software products-2019 that inter-alia includes nurturing 10,000 technology startups in software products industry and upskillings of 1,000,000 IT professionals.
• National programme on AI has been designed with priority mission areas, namely Healthcare, Agriculture, Education, smart cities, Transportation, Cyber security energy, finance and Indian Languages.
• This programme will be implemented in a hub and spoke model, wherein the proposed National Centre on Artificial Intelligence will act as the hub and Centres of Excellence (CoEs) along with startups will act as spokes. CoEs will facilitates startups industry and deployment of AI based solutions and will aid Reasearch and Academic institutions in the applied research.
• Meity Startups Hub (MSH) has been set-up under the aegis of ministry of Electronics and IT to promote techonology innovation, startups and creation of Intellectual Properties.
• MeitY has recently released “INDIA TRILLION DOLLAR DIGITAL OPPOTUINITY” report to boost the scale, scope and digital innovation of citizen centric services which can result in a quantum jump in digital contribution to the Indian economy USD 1 Trillion by 2025. Nine specific areas have been identified for government intervention.
• These are: i) Doubling farmers’ income; ii) Make in digital India, make for India, Make for world; iii) Jobs and skills for the future; iv) 21st century IT infrastructure & software capabilities; v) e-Governance of the future; vi) Healthcare for all; vii) Quality education for the future; viii) Energy for all; ix) Next- generation financial services

Conclusion

• India’s resonance towards digital technologies has now moved from the corridors of the empowered society and providing substantive benefits to the common masses, thus demonstrating the power of technology.

Govt is embracing changing landscape of technology & is committed to ensure state-of-the-art technology enabled citizen, welfare of society and for socio-economic development of the country.

The use of geographic information system (GIS) as a decision support system for development planning is a critical component of e-Kranti pillar under the digital India programme.

• To leverage GIS under digital India, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) had launched National Centre of Geo-informatics (NCoG) in December 2015.
• NCoG platform is aimed as a single source GIS platform for sharing, collaboration, location-based analytics and as a decision support system, catering to the central and the state government departments across the country.

 

Potential of GIS:

• GIS has the potential for enabling good governance through effective and efficient monitoring of schemes; proactive identification of gaps in the implementation of schemes /programmes; and efficient allocation/management of resources.
• This has been reflected in various key projects including Government Land Information System, Mining Surveillance System, GIS platform for Aspirational Districts, Water Resources, Industrial Information System and Social Benefits Management System.
• The NCoG platform has been working on other important projects including Government Land Information System, National Mission for Cultural Mapping, School Information System, Solid Waste Disposal and Management System, Internal Management System for Security Agencies and Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakaram (RBSK) among many others.
• In addition, the government is also working on leveraging and integrating emerging technologies such as Blockchain, AI, machine learning, internet of things (IoT), Big data analytics with GIS to give further boost to development planning, foster citizen-centric service delivery and good governance.

Government of India has been at the forefront of using technology in different aspects of governance. National Informatics Centre, an attached office of ministry of electronics &IT, has been closely working with government in provisioning state of the art infrastructure. Digital Infrastructure for government was further strengthened through a number of initiatives taken under the National e- Governance Plan.

• In line with the approach of embracing new technologies areas such as Artificial Intelligence, IOT, 5G, Edge computing, etc., have been identified.
• Initiatives have been undertaken to establish Centres of Excellence for Data Analytics, Block Chain, Artificial Intelligence, etc. to ensure that the Government infrastructure is future ready in terms of technology adoption and its applicability in various initiatives.

 

Key components of digital infrastructure for government:

1. PAN INDIA NETWORK
2. National Informatics Centre Network (India) NICNET- the pan India communication network for exclusive use of government has continuously evolved since 1980s. It now connects government offices across the length and breadth of India. NICNET is at the base of all government communications right from Government to Government (G2G), Government to Citizen (G2C) as well as Government to Business (G2B) communication.
3. National Knowledge Network (NKN) – is another important initiative which provides multigigabit nationwide network connected through 10G backbone. It also extends high-speed connectivity to leading research and academic institutions of the Country. NKN is steadily evolving as the national education research network (NREN) of India.
4. Data Centres: A Host to e-Governance Applications:

• Realizing the importance of Data Centres, National Informatics Centre (NIC) has established large data centers at Delhi, Hyderabad, Bhubaneswar and Pune. Mini data centers are also operational in all NIC state centers to cater to the state level.
• Hosting support is being provided from Data Centers and National Cloud for approximately 10,000 various critical e-governance projects, viz. E-procurement, Public Financial Monitoring System (CPSMS), e-Lekha, e-panchayat, Aadhaar Enabled Biometric Attendance System (AEBAS), etc.

 

1. Command and Control Centre

• There was a need to setup a specialized center to provide nationwide view for ICT infrastructure for effective monitoring and management and also to ensure availability of all critical services. Command and Control Centre have been set up at NIC Headquarters which has increased the agility of NIC’s ICT infrastructure.

1. National Cloud (MeghRaj)

• Govt of India initiated a Government Cloud initiative titled “MeghRaj” in 2014.
• Setting up a secured cloud infrastructure has reduced considerable amount of time in provisioning of digital infrastructure.
• Various Government initiatives and schemes, such as Swatch Bharat Mission, My-Gov, e-Hospital, National Scholarship, e-Transport etc., have been successfully launched due to a robust and agile cloud infrastructure.

1. Geospatial Technology

• Geographical Information System (GIS) have improved the accessibility of various e-Governance services by offering location based access.
• Bharat Maps is a multi-layered GIS platform/web services comprising of seamless country wide bases maps aligned as per the global geo spatial standards.
• GIS is helping MGNREGA workers to get information about availability of works in the near locations, work site location information, real time transparent attendance and payments information.
• At the same time, it is benefiting the citizens by enabling geo portal for MGNREGA assets, which will enhance the concurrent social audit by citizens and facilitates feedback information on current status of work, quality validation, etc.

1. Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT)

• Public Finance Management System (PFMS) electronically interfaces with all banks and given a holistic view of the overall flow of funds in the Government, thereby eliminating delay and increasing transparency.
• With the advent of technology and Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) coming up a paradigm shift has been experienced in the way benefits are transferred to the citizens.

1. Email Services

• As part of the mandate under the Digital India Programmed, the Government provided a secure email service to all for official communication.
• Further, to improve citizen engagement, SMS Service was launched encoring real time updates to users.

1. Video Conferencing

• NIC has been offering Video Conferencing services since 1995 for connecting and bringing administration close to each other.
• Video Conferencing is now extensively used at all levels of government.

1. Cyber Security

• To address ever increasing threat of cyber-attacks in terms of their magnitude as well as their sophistication, Computer Emergency Response Team (NIC-CERT) group has been constituted with an objective of analyzing, monitoring and responding to cyber threats on critical government cyber infrastructure, like websites, emails and various services.
• NIC-CERT works in close guidance of CERT-In, which is the national nodal agency for responding to computer security incidents as and when they occur.

J .Digital Platforms

• Availability of cloud infrastructure in Government has given rise to launch of number of digital platforms at National level (One Nation One Platform).
• With a stable, reliable and best in class digital infrastructure, the government of India along with NIC and other key stakeholders have successfully set-up various services such as e-Office, e-Transport, e-Hospital to name a few.
• New citizen focused initiatives like mobile-based traffic enforcement solution through e-challan, mobile extension for service in the form of Parivahan app are innovations emerging from such platforms.
• e-Way Bill system has been a key lever in the success of Good and service tax(GST) implementation.
• For rural development, the government has harnessed technology for implementing various ICT application in various programs such as Pradhan Mantri Aawaas Yojana- Gramin (PMAY-G), National Social Assistance Program (NSAP), Deen Dayal Upadhayay Grameen Kaushalya Yojana (DDUGKY), etc.

 

Digital empowerment through ‘Maximum Governance, Minimum Government’ is not a mere slogan. Instead, it is a conscious strategy toward ushering reforms in governance and transforming India, making governance simple, fast, flexible and effective by application of innovation and technology. This also leads to participative governance, a key element of a responsible democracy.

Protection of Data in Era of Digital Empowerment

• In order to ensure growth of the digital economy while keeping personal data of citizens secure and protected, the government is working towards formulation of Personal Data Protection Framework.
• The National Policy on Software Products has also been formulated that envisages creation of robust Indian software product development ecosystem, thereby enabling IP driven holistic growth of the IT industry.
• The policy aims to develop India as the global software product hub, driven by innovation, improved commercialization, sustainable intellectual property (IP), promoting technology startups and specialized skill sets.
• It also aims at alignment with other government initiatives, such as, Start-up India, Make in India and Digital India, Skill India etc. so as to create Indian software products industry of USD-70-80 billion with direct and indirect employment of ~3.5 million by 2025.
• The National Policy on Electronics, 2019 aims to further promote domestic manufacturing promote domestic manufacturing and export to achieve a turnover of approx. rs.26 lakh crore by 2025.

Conclusion

Having built a strong foundation of digital infrastructure and vastly expanded digital access and outreach, India is now poised for a robust growth of digital technologies in all sectors of the economy that will lead to creation of up to $1 trillion of economy value from the digital economy in 2025.

India has traditionally been cash based society. This dominance of cash in Indian society has been primarily due three reasons:-

1. Lack of payment acceptance infrastructure.
2. Bank accounts perceived as account for saving rather than accounts for payments by a majority of the population.
3. Cash based payments seem to be zero cost and hassle-free as cost of cash is distributed and invisible.

 

• Till November 2016, only 15 lakh merchants had been enabled with PoS by over 40 banks. This meant that only 2.5% of India’s 6 crore merchants had an option of receiving payments through cards. This changed dramatically with the advent of QR code based payments. Today, there are over 1.2 crore merchants having QR code who give an option to their customers, to pay through their wallet or bank account.
• The QR code based payment have been attractive to merchants as it does not have traditional costs associated with PoS terminals- cost of PoS terminal, cost of maintaining internet, maintenance of PoS terminal, high MDR etc.
• India has over 100 crore-bank accounts with over 90 crore-debit cards. The number of customers using bank accounts for digital payments is less than 5 crore. Many people find payment through bank accounts cumbersome and/ or risky.
• The advent of Unified Payment Interface (UPI) has simplified use of bank accounts for payments for people who are comfortable to pay directly from their bank accounts.

 

Cash vs Digital Payment

• Cash has an inherent benefit of being universally accepted and instantly usable. However there is a cost of cash in the form of expensive cash management infrastructure. Transitioning to digital payments will lead to significant reduction in costs due to inefficiencies associated with cash.
• Further cash is anonymous and leaves no trace visible in the system. On the other hand, Digital payment leaves a footprints across the ecosystem and is traceable.
• In P2M (person to merchants) digital payments there is a central neutral party which facilitates arbitration and provides a channel for dispute resolution with merchants. On the other hand, cash is a bilateral transaction between a costumer and a merchant. In addition while on-boarding merchants on digital payment platform due diligence is undertaken as per the requirements of the Indian Government. This greatly removes fraud /spurious merchants.

 

Financial Inclusion:

• Government of India envisions financial inclusion of all sections of the society.
• The four key elements of financial inclusion are: payments, credit, investments and insurance; and technology (Jan dhan, aadhaar, mobile) has ushered a digital revolution ensuring that marginalized sections of the society are also brought into financial mainstream.
• With regard to financial literacy, the Indian Government has undertaken several campaigns.

 

Way Forward:

• While discussing digital payments, user privacy is of paramount importance. The banking and financial services industry is eagerly awaiting the passage of Personal Data Protection Bill.
• This Bill sets out how the personal data of individuals is processed by the Government and private entities incorporated in India and abroad.
• The Supreme Court of India while delivering its judgment on the constitutional validity of Aadhaar on 26th September 2018, also asked the Government of India to bring in a robust law for data protection at the earliest. The Indian Government should encourage innovation in digital payments. There should be a push for increasing digital payments acceptance infrastructure.
• The entities in the digital payments space should be given freedom to enable merchants to accept digital payments in whatever way they deem fit.

 

Conclusion

• The key to propagating digital payments is to ensure trust in the system both from the costumer as well as the merchant.
• The banking and financial services industry under the guidance of the Indian Government has taken several measures to build trust and a lot more needs to be done.

 

The integral part of growth for a country is leveraging technology to leapfrog development by focusing on three pillars namely improved connectivity and access, focused skilling and capacity building and sustainable innovation. With India strategically investing in digital transforming, building a strong demographics dividend that reaches the remotest corners of our vast country is an important pivot.

• India has made stride in universalizing primary education – ensuring improvement in both enrolment and completion rates of primary and elementary school.
• Along with budgetary commitments to education, Path-breaking initiatives such as NITI Aayog’s Atal Innovation Mission have made a dent on the learning culture.
• Tinkering labs have not only put inquisitiveness at the heart of the learning process but have also democratized access to technology for the larger good.
• From directing CSR funds to supporting diverse initiatives focused on developing future ready workforce, education is perhaps the sector with maximum multi-modal investment. A lot has been done- but there still are many miles to traverse.

Way forward: Where can technology be leveraged?

1. Providing Access and Bridging the Divide

• Well-meaning revolutions in form of content, videos, MOOCs have proliferated the education sector regardless of social construct. However, while providing content on fingertips is the first step and it alone cannot be an effective and sustainable solution.
• To become a knowledge economy, we must embrace creation of knowledge and content, and not just consume it passively. It is important or both students and teachers to play an active role in creating ingenious content.
• ICT is also helping classrooms to evolve from being isolated block by expanding the scope for collaboration and communication between students, teachers and administration from different geographies.
• Digital pedagogies are also injecting values necessary for developing emotional and intelligence by building skills and competencies,

2. Capacity Building of Teachers

• It is important to not just equip teachers with ICT device and knowledge but also to handhold them through the journey of being productive in an ICT enabled classroom. Initiative like upskilling of teachers through common service centers are strategically well aligned with this vision.

3. Need to adapt to varying needs

• The size of the school, existing infrastructure, and rural urban divide create a perceptible difference in a school’s maturity and ICT readiness. There is a need to be cognizant of varying needs of these types of schools and many more in the middle of this spectrum.

Conclusion:

Fostering innovation and the spirit to unlearn and relearn is at the heart of the digital transformation that should be aimed for. For this, the entire ecosystem of education will have to be considered: students, teachers, administrations, and policy makers are all important parts of this equation. Also, to embrace the change, investing in building critical thinking ability and capacity will be most important.

As India embarks on digitization journey, several digital revolutions and fundamental changes are happening in the way citizens avail various services from both government and private organizations. Both government organizations and corporates are transforming their operating models to optimally use digital solutions to reach out to customers/citizens.

World is home to billion people with disability and more than 100million citizens with disability reside in India. Digital transformation has facilitated ease of accessing products and services for all citizens whereas citizens with disability are empowered to access various products/services with ease.

Assistive Technology:

• Citizens with disability use assistive technology to access various mode of ICT channels. Blind or visually impaired citizen would use screen reader which would provide audio output of operating system.
• Non-Visual Display Access (NVDA), an open source screen reading software, is now available in 7 Indian languages.
• Avaz, another invention from India, is an alternative and augmentative communication device. It works by generating speech from limited muscle movements like that from the head or by the hand, and is used by people with speech disorders such as cerebral palsy, autism, intellectual disability, and aphasia.
• Kabi, is an app for speech impaired children which assists them for quick communication with the external world by selecting pictograph image on their hand held Android devices.
• Blee watch is a smart watch especially designed for the needs of hearing impaired citizens.

e-Services leading to inclusion:

• e-Services have led to financial inclusion of citizens with disabilities among all the other things such as access to transport, food etc. easier.
• Citizens with disability are also contributing to conversation with Government and private enterprises in terms of improving their service delivery mechanism.
• This digital channel of service delivery mechanism has empowered citizens with disability to raise a grievance with ease, at the comfort of being at their own residence.

Government Initiatives:

• Government of India has launched an accessible India campaign with an objective of achieving complete accessible physical infrastructure, transport system and ICT echo system.
• DAISY Forum of India is a consortium of Not for Profit organizations from India who are involved in production and distribution of books and reading material in accessible formats for persons who cannot read normal print. DAISY forum of India (DFI) has launched Sugamya Pustakalaya, an online library of digital books in accessible format for print impaired citizens in collaboration with Government of India.
• Marrakesh VIP Treaty facilitates access to published works to Visually Impaired persons and persons with Print Disabilities. The Treaty permits for copyright exceptions to facilitate the creation of accessible versions of books and other copyrighted worked for visually impaired persons and those with print disabilities. India was the first country to ratify the treaty in 2014.
• Ministry of Urban Development has issued a notification mandating that all cities within Smart City Mission project have to ensure that their ICT is digitally accessible, enabling citizens with disability to avail Government services with ease.
• Dial 112 mobile app, initiative undertaken by Government of Chhattisgarh, enabling citizens of Chhattisgarh to report emergency by dialing 112.
• Recent passage of the Revised Person With Disability Act (RPWD) 2016 further stresses on digital inclusion within digital India mandate conformance to international accessible standard for all international accessible standard for all government e-Services. Section 42 of this Act requires the appropriate government to ensure that all content in audio, print and electronic formats are accessible.

Conclusion:

• Access to web, mobile apps etc. are the basic rights of every citizen and inclusive e-Services facilitate citizens with disability to avail these rights and bridge the growing digital divide.
• Instead of creating dedicated solutions for citizens with disability within the cyber space, the aim should be to create a Universal Design offering access to all, including citizens with disability.
• The design of products should be made user friendly for all, regardless of sex, age, situation or disability and to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaption or specialized design.

Agricultural Services such as agricultural advisories, financial services, agricultural marketing and risk transfer are required for each Agricultural Commodity Value System (AVS) of a farmer and India has been blessed with about 400 Agricultural Commodity Value Systems.  Digital network for farmers (DNF) – AGRISNET, AGMAKNET, FISHNET, APHNET, FETNET etc. have been viewed as strength, wealth and prosperity of farming household in India.

Issues:

• Many national level programmes, viz Digital India, Make in India, Skill India, Startup India and Stand- Up India have faced operational difficulties for its impact at farm level and farmer level, and that too at small and marginal farmers level.
• The Indian agriculture system is confronted with its own sheer complexity, inadequate factors of production, weather uncertainties, multiplicity of schemes and multiplicity of institutions, at farm level, and hence there is no size neutral solution possible.

Bridging the Gaps in Human Resources Development

• In India, there are about 263 million people (54.6 percent) engaged in the agriculture sector and over 50 per cent of them are agricultural laborers.
• 90 per cent of current jobs in agriculture are skill based where only about 6 per cent of work force has received vocational training. There is thus a pronounced “skill gap” both in terms of quality and quantity.
• The existing farm extension system needs to broad-based problem oriented, to help farmers overcome their “point of no return” difficulties.
• ATMA and KVK are the two eyes of the present extension system which further require a “third eye” for problem resolution; may be ICT enabled Agriculture polytechnics for bridging the emerging gaps in development of human resources for farm level functionaries.
• E-Governance and agriculture informatics is the pathway for development 2.0 in food and agriculture in India.
• This requires an institutional approach by creating National Centre for IT in Agriculture (NCITA), State Centres for IT in agriculture (SCITAs), District Centres of IT in Agriculture (DCITs), and Block Centres for IT in agriculture (BCITA) to convert “agricultural information” into a “commodity” for use.
• The National Digital Communication Policy 2018 , under its mission 2022, has envisaged
  1. Connect India- BharatNet, GramNet, NagarNet and Jan WiFi infrastructure
  2. Propel India through services based on 5G, AI, Blockchain, IOT, Cloud Computing and big data analystics, and
  3. Secure India ensuring sovereignty, safety and security of digital communications.

Digitalized Farm Centric Services: e-agriculture

• Various studies have brought out challenges faced by the farming community with respect to citizen charter, Investment & Risk management, Technology solution – Authentication, Accessibility, availability and affordability, Capacity building & competency development, and Information security issues.
• The need for Agri StartUps in following areas has been highlighted.

1. Farm management services,
2. e-commerce services, and
3. Government Schemes O & M which are spread across the entire Agri value system.

• In order to boost farmer’s income, India requires to adopt strategic intervention of ICT in Farming System Life Cycle, through a robust National Level Farmers Database. Digitalization in Farming system aims at farm as ‘economic unit’, household (farmer) as “social unit,” and land as “environmental unit”.
• The convergence of various sectoral programmes / schemes of agricultural and rural development is essential at village level.
• Both agricultural and rural development officers, working at block level, are not yet professionally trained to operationalise “Integrated Landuse Planning for Sustainable Agricultural and Rural Development” at grassroots level.
• The ministry of finance has made the mandatory use of Public Finance Management System (PFMS) for all central sector schemes, so as to ensure that the benefits of the various government schemes reach to the last mile, and also to know the actual status of utilization of funds by the multiple implementing agencies of the central and the state governments.
• The emerging Agri StartUps may consider providing digitalized services to farmers through FPOs, for impacting farming community, fisheries and agro-forestry, positively.

Way Forward:

In agriculture sector, it is “location specific”, ‘farm specific’ and ‘farmer specific’ services that are required to be facilitated. The possible action plant can be as follows:

• Setting up of a National Centre for IT in Agriculture (NCITA).
• Operationalisaton of the DFI-2022 (Doubling Farmers’ Income by 2022) Digital Technology Mission Mode project.
• Creation of National Database on 13 crore farmers.
• Strengthening the operational Digital Network for Farmers (DNF) – AGRISNET, AGMARKNET, HORTNET, APHNET, FISHNET, FERTNET etc.
• Steps to operationalize NeGP-AMMP projects which have been in cold storage for a long time.
• Steps to dedicate BharatNet for farmers.
• Creation of a farmer welfare portal in 22 constitutionally recognized language, for proactively dealing with their grievances redressed.
• Agricultural informatics programmer at M.TECH, B.TECH and P.G. Level to attract rural youth into S&T based farming methods.