Relevance: GS-3: Science and Technology- developments and their applications and effects in everyday life; Achievements of Indians in science & technology; indigenization of technology and developing new technology; Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, and robotics.

Key Phrases : National e-Governance Division, Cloud Computing, Project Meghraj, Project ASMAN, Project Mausam, Digital India Programme

Context:

• NeGD organizes a Capacity Building programme in Cloud Computing for central and state government officials.
• This necessitates the discussion about the role of NeGD in the digital arena.

Background

• The future roadmap of the digital revolution in India includes Cloud Computing in a big way.
• In Addition, e-Governance is already at the vanguard of revolutionizing governance in the country from ‘system and power-centered’ to ‘resident and service-centered’.
• Fusing the two together, the NeGD organized the first batch of Capacity Building programme in Cloud Computing for government officials of Central Line ministries, State/UT Departments, Mission Mode Project officers, e-Governance Project heads and State e-Mission teams.

National e-Governance Division

• In 2009, it was created by the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) as an Independent Business Division under the Digital India Corporation.
• It has been playing a pivotal role in supporting the MeitY in Programme Management and implementation of e-Governance Projects and initiatives undertaken by Ministries/ Departments, both at the Central and State levels.

Roles and Responsibilities of NeGD

• Providing strategic direction in terms of framing policies and implementation strategy for the Digital India Programme in different domains of e-Governance.
• Proactive support to Central and State Governments for Mission Mode Projects and other e-Governance projects. Providing technical assistance in their e-Governance projects either directly or in collaboration with professional consultants.
• Acting as a facilitator and catalyst for implementation of the Digital India Program by various Ministries and State Governments.
• Undertaking technical appraisal of e-Governance projects for examining issues like overall technology, architecture, framework standards, security policy, service delivery mechanism, sharing of common infrastructure, etc.
• Developing generic / model Expression of Interest, Request for Proposal, Standard Contracts, PPP Models and other related documents for various stages and requirements of projects for use by the States.
• Ensuring effective citizen engagement and communication with all stakeholders using offline and Social Media channels.
• Impact assessment and e-Readiness measurement of e-Governance projects of all States / UTs.
• Recruitment, deployment and HR management of specialized resources in the State e-Governance Mission Teams in all States and UTs

Training and development initiatives

• Development of competency frameworks, training guidelines, case studies, etc.
• Developing Online and Web-based Training and setting up Learning Management Systems.
• Knowledge management and sharing through workshops, development of case studies, sharing best practices and creation of knowledge repositories, etc.

Projects under NeGD

• UMANG - to facilitate single-point access through mobile apps anytime, anywhere.
• DigiLocker - to provide citizens with 'Digital Empowerment' by allowing them to access authentic digital documents through a Digital Document Wallet.
• BISAG-N - to undertake Technology Development & Management, Research & Development, facilitate National & International Cooperation, Capacity Building and support Technology transfer & Entrepreneurship Development in the area of Geo-Spatial Technology.
• Rapid Assessment System - for online instant feedback for e-services.
• OpenForge platform - to promote sharing and reuse of e-governance application source code.
• Learning Management System - a software application that automates the administration, tracking and reporting of training events.

Recently held Capacity Building programme

• The two-day programme was held at the Haryana Institute of Public Administration covering participants from Delhi-NCR.
• The programme is designed to build capacities, within the Government at both the Central and State levels, by adapting a synchronized approach to ensure the availability of adequate knowledge, appropriate competencies and skill-set to optimally utilize the huge benefits of cloud computing in e-Governance practices.
• Projects with cloud computing offer integration management with automated problem resolution, manage security end-to-end, and help budget based on actual usage of data.
• At a national level, cloud architectures can benefit the Government to simultaneously utilize resources optimally and also accelerate delivery of e-services.

Key domain issues under discussion

• The workshop brought together an array of subject matter experts from the industry, academia and the government to speak on key domain issues -
  • Cloud fundamentals,
  • India’s Cloud journey,
  • Cloud building blocks,
  • Procurement of Cloud services,
  • Regulatory and policy framework for Cloud,
  • Challenges associated with Cloud implementation and
  • Future of Cloud on digital transformation, with engaging presentations on successful Cloud use cases.
• Session discussions also featured essential training on various components of Cloud computing -
  • Custom bidding for Cloud services,
  • Establishment of Pay-per-use and billing frequency with Cloud service providers,
  • Negotiation instruments for dynamic services under Cloud,
  • Best practices in Cloud procurement,
  • Focus on the Computing requirements,
  • TRAI and MeitY guidelines on Cloud Computing and
  • ITU global standards on Cloud Computing.

Significance of this development

• Technology has been leapfrogging over the past two decades and one such technology rapidly scaling up is the Cloud-based systems driving businesses and touching every aspect of our daily lives.
• Anything that is available via the internet has the service being delivered out of a cloud-based application and IT Infrastructure.
• Within this decade, Cloud Computing will replace the traditional data centers and emerge as the prominent solution for data analytics and storage, as per a recent study done on the topic.

Way Forward

• Witnessing attendance from 31 participants - mostly officers from Central Line Ministries, New Delhi and State Governments of Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Goa, Mizoram and Uttarakhand – capacity-building programmes on the theme of cloud computing would move forward with physical programmes to be conducted in the East, West and South zones of India, this year.

Source: PIB

Mains Question:

Q. Cloud Computing has the potential to replace traditional data centres and emerge as the prominent solution for data analytics and storage. Elucidate. [150 Words].