ELCOT: The Change Agent for an E-State

Dr Santhosh Babu, IAS, Managing Director of Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu Limited (ELCOT), gives shape to ambitious eGovernance and ICT skill development projects in Tamil Nadu. In an exclusive interview, Dr Babu shares his vision for paper-less Tamil Nadu. Excerpts:

Dr. Santhosh Babu IAS, Managing Director, ELCOT

What is the end you have in mind for eGovernance projects in Tamil Nadu?

Tamil Nadu is one of the first states to have and ICT policy and the ICT policy 2008 furthers the gains achieved.

The Government of Tamil Nadus proactive ICT policy will enable its vision of achieving 25% production share of the Indian ICT industry by 2011.

Currently it is at 11%. Achieving the vision would create 0.8 million direct and 2.2 million indirect employment by 2011. We are active partners for the projects of National e-Governance Plan. With the Centre s assistance, we will be rolling out 5440 Common Service Centres by February, 2009, to provide the digital connectivity for eGovernance in rural areas. This will serve as our front-end network, while our State Data Centre and TNSWAN will provide the backend support, along with the e-district projects.

In the long run, we would convert all the districts as e-Districts with emphasis on less paper work at government offices of all departments. The pilot project is currently on in a few districts like Tiruvarur, Krishnagiri, Coimbatore, Perambalur and Ariyalur. Another initiative of ELCOT is the development of knowledge management system for the State headquarters to reduce paper work. Our mantra is that e-Governance should maximise virtual interactions between citizens-government and minimise physical interactions between citizen and government offices. The speed of eGovernance is nothing but the speed of file movement in government offices.

We have to therefore digitise files and automate file movement to enhance eGovernance.

Do you envisage a new role for ELCOT in the changing scenarios in the industry?

ELCOT has forayed into promoting Special Economic Zones at seven districts, with an objective to create world-class infrastructure at tier-II and tier-III cities for

IT companies. Training is now a major part of our strategy. In association with CII, we are launching ICT Academy to train about 5000 trainers who in turn will impart ICT skills to over 2.5 lakh students, using virtual classrooms. We will soon come up with a policy for rural BPO with NASSCOM as a knowledge partner.

FOSTeRA (Fostering technologies in rural areas) of Krishnagiri District administration will serve as a model for rural BPOs this model aims to bring tenth standard school dropouts into the BPO fold.