Table of Contents

Digital Service Delivery

Relevance

GS 2: Government Policies & Interventions
GS 3: Technology Missions

Introduction

Digital India has helped ease access to services for millions of people, particularly the poor and needy in the country.
Whether it’s the issuance of Aadhar card, driving licence, birth certificate or payment of electricity bill, water bill, or income tax return, these can now be processed via the Digital India platform faster & easily and even in villages, these things are being done through Common Service Centres.
India has emerged as a data powerhouse in the World and it is taking all steps for data protection through legislative and other measures.
India now has the world’s largest digital identity system – Aadhar.

What is Digital Service?

The word “Digital” means information available in electronic form that is readable and can be manipulated by a computing device.
The word “Service” means a capability for exchanging information such as an order, a payment, or pay slip between your organization and other parties like customers, vendors and employees.
Consequently “Digital Service” means a capability for exchanging information in electronic form using computing devices. Even though other words like application, solution or platform can be interchangeably used in place of “Service”

India has moved toward ”Digital Delivery of Services”

Common Services Centres (CSCs)

CSCs are the world’s largest digital service delivery network, with wide reach in rural areas upto Gram Panchayat & Block level.
These information and communication technology-enabled kiosks with broadband connectivity has been providing various government, private and social services to the citizens.

PMGDISHSA

The Government of India introduced its flagship Digital Literacy Programme, “Pradhan Mantri Gramin Digital SakshartaAbhiyan (PMGDISHA)” in February 2017.
The Scheme envisages to make six crore persons in rural areas, across States/UTs, digitally literate, reaching around 40% of rural households by covering one member from every household where there is no digitally literate person.

Umang App

The UMANG mobile app (Unified Mobile Application for New-age Governance) is a Government of India single, unified, secure, multi-channel, multi-platform, multi-lingual, multi-service mobile app, providing access to high impact services of various organizations (Central and State).
It was launched in 2017.
UMANG brings major government services on a single mobile app, with a larger goal to make the government accessible on mobile phones of citizens.
UMANG app has already started to provide map functionality through MapmyIndia in the following services:

- Mera Ration – Through UMANG, users can identify and navigate to the ‘Nearest Fair Price Shops’ as shops are visible in the form of pointers on MapmyIndia integrated map.
- eNAM – Through UMANG, ‘Mandi Near Me’ service will help users to identify and navigate to the nearby mandis pointed on the map.
- Damini – ‘Damini Lightning Alerts’ service is to provide lightning alerts to users by giving a visual ofnearby areaswhere lightning has struck in the last few minutes. This alert mechanism provides the possibility of lightning strikes on map view.

Covid-19 & Digitalization

India is successfully driving the World’s largest technology driven vaccination campaign through indigenously developed CoWIN platform, Development and use of Aarogya Setu app for Covid management & leading the world in Digital Payments, Direct Benefit transfers of Subsidy and Fintech technology.

Digital India Program

Digital India Programme was launched in 2015.
The Digital India Programme had set out 3 clear objectives to be achieved.

1. To transform the lives of citizens.
2. To expand economic opportunities.
3. To create strategic capabilities in certain areas of technology.

Conclusion

India has become one of the pre-eminent Nations in the use of technology not just in conventional areas of R&D, technology development & innovations, but in the use of technology to empower & transform citizen’s lives. India’s Digital Economy is also expanding and driving the growth of the Indian economy towards the goal of a $5 trillion economy.