e-Shakti Smart CardsA Government of Bihar initiative

Case Study: eShakti CardAn Innovative Project which got accolades for its grass-root implementation and innovative approach to meet the challenges of the MNREGA project.

Group Names

ABHILASHA SINHA (EEPHRM-01-01)POONAM DHIMAN (EEPHRM-01-10)PRIYANKA KRISHNA (EEPHRM-01-11)SAPNA GUPTA (EEPHRM-01-18)SWATI CHANDRA (EEPHRM-01-23)

Introduction

Government of Bihar was eager to invent something new in the field of e-Governance to mark its presence in the state of Bihar and also to escalate the growth of development. With a raw idea of what Government wanted, a tender was floated for parties to provide shape to their creative idea. Smaarftech (a subsidiary of Glodyne Technoserve Ltd) was able to meet the expectation of Government in giving a practical layout to this innovative thought. Rest became history with implementation of first of its kind, an e-Governance project named e-Shakti. e-Shakti project had a great start in the year 2009. Patna was the first Pilot district where pilot project was completed successfully in 2009. Many leading newspapers including the Indian Express featured the story on the success of this project [Annexure I, 4th Jan 2010]. The project was rated as the best e-governance project in India and also won the PC Quest Award for the Best IT Implementation Project in the country. Looking at the success of the implementation, Mr. Nandan Nilekani, CEO UID project had recognized it the project as the Role Model Project for the rest of the states where implementation was still due*. [Annexure 1]e-Shakti was A great initiative which led to the improvement of an existing MNREGA system

MNREGA Scheme

MMNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005), ensures livelihood security to all living in rural areas of India. It provides at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household, whose adult member volunteers to do unskilled manual work. The member can apply for registration orally or in writing to the Local Gram Panchayat. On approval the member is provided with the Job Card within fifteen days of application, bearing his photograph. Permissible works predominantly includes water and soil conversation, afforestation and land development works. The wages are paid under the guidelines of as the Minimum Wages Act, 1948, irrespective of gender biases. The shelf (duration) life of the project is recommended by the Gram Sabha and approved by the Zila Parishad. At least 50% of the projects are allocated to the Gram Panchayats for execution. The payment tof labour is done by the people authorized by the Government and the Gram Panchayats.

The Challenges of MNREGA

It was There was a dire need of the time to regularize the system, as current the system was rampant with malpractices such as irregularities in attendance and payments system. The labor was on muster role; attendance and payments were managed manually, which resulted in the exploitation of the initiative in the hands of officers bureaucrats who were handling the Scheme. To ensure safety and security to the contract labor, the then Honable Chief minister of Bihar, Mr. Nitish Kumar announced the e-Shakti Project (a Bihar Government Initiative) as ICT (Information and Communication Technology) intervention in the related field. The project had the potential to not only to generate more employment, but to also effect transformation in rural, economic and social aspects/ featuresrelations at many levels.

The e- Shakti Project (initiative which was to bring the desired improvements in an ongoing MNREGA system )

The e-Shakti initiative was started in 2009 to eliminate malpractices and corruption in implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) in Bihar. It was has been an initiative by the dDepartment of Rural Development (DoRD), Ggovernment of Bihar, was inspired by Honable Chief Minister, Mr. Nitish Kumar, monitored by BeST, Nodal agency BELTRON and executed by Smaarftech for successful implementation of MNREGA in the state.Since there had been allegations that the MNREGA was beset with corruption and there was no proper method of work measurement, taking attendance and disbursing wages; e-Shakti came up with ICT (Information and Communication Technology) (ICT) which was put to use to rideliminate MNREGA of such charges in MNREGA..The state government decided to cover one one million beneficiaries under the e-Shakti scheme for its pilot districtby March 31, 2010. Subsequently over the next four remaining years, the project would be set up in the restmaining 37 districts to cover 24 million MNREGA beneficiaries in approximately 39,000 villages spread over 534 blocks of Bihar. [Annexure 2]The project facilitates registration process of individuals, which includes recording of personal information as well as biometric information (photograph and all 10 fingerprints). A separate bank account has also been opened for each adult member of the household.e-Shakti Project was done in collaboration with Department of Rural Development , Beltron (Nodal Agency), BeST (Monitoring Agency) and Smaarftech (overall implementation).

Aims and ObjectiveThis project aimed at bringing transparency & accountability in the system, faster & reliable payment services to workers, curtailing malpractices in project implementation, effective project management with improvement in quality of implementation by replacing paper work/ manual work for muster (covering every adult above 18 years residing in rural Bihar) through technology. With e-Shakti, the processes of registration, receipt, job demand, muster rolls, work, attendance, calculations and disbursement of wages had been digitized. It was also one of the largest projects globally to be hosted on a private cloud technology platform. In addition, advance anti-duplication system had been deployed on the project. [Annexure 32]

Project Implementation :Implementation:

It started with creating awareness and sensitization about the project through extensive use of approved IEC (Information, Education and Communication) materials like-posters pamphlets, hoardings, project brief leaflets, FAQ booklet, use of loudspeakers, and door-to-door campaigns. The data collection for the project was classified into two forms, Textual data through format approved by DoRD (Department Of Rural Development) and Biometric data through Scanners (for finger impressions) and Webcam (for photograph). Further, AFIS (Automated Finger Identification System) was used for scrutiny of information collected. After Verification and validation by AFIS, both the data forms were merged. After compilation of data, smart card, personalized polycarbonate plastic card containing personal information, fingerprints and photograph) was published and distributed. Panchayat Rozgar Sewaks or business correspondents could then use these cards at worksites for marking attendance and payment of wages To facilitate use of smart cards, the team useds handheld machines with updated software applications, which is connected with servers through GPRS and gives printed receipt of attendance and different transactions done. For the payment every smart card holder requires a bank account (no frill account) which is connected with smart card system, and wages are directly credited to the account with facilities like over draft account, remittance, recurring deposit, fixed deposit, daily deposit and has a withdrawal limit of INR 1000 daily. For the reparation of complaints, queries/information and problems in a specified time, there wasis a 24*7 call center, that couldan be accessed through use of web application by simply making a call on toll free number. [Annexure 43]

Challenge and Innovation Matrix

SNThe challenges (MNREGA)Innovation of e-Shakti

1. Irregularities in attendanceAttendance through Biometric machine and Smart Cards Data Collection through webcam/ Biometric finger-print scanners

2. Irregularities in payments systemWages directly debited into bank accounts of the smart card holder/worker

3. Exploitation of the initiative in the hands of officers bureaucratsTechnological intervention such as Handheld Biometric machines, which were connected to servers through GPRS to eliminate the middleman and officers.

4. Heavy paper work/ Muster rolls Direct cloud computing for assimilation of data and anti duplication technology/ software.

5. Non Accountability GPRS and bio metric scanning for complete and real-time accountability.

6. Data duplicationDeployment of AFIS

7. No grievance redressal system24*7 dedicated e-Shakti call centre for query & complaint registration with ticket number and resolution TAT.

Additional Tangible and non tangible benefits1. Employement generation for implementation of smart card and e-shakti program2. Assimilation and compilation of complete Rural Data digitally which can be used for later schemes3. A sense of support from the government at the grass-root level.

Empowering the Iinitiative

Payment to worker through e-Shakti Smart Card psychologically empowered the initiative for rural masses and strategically to its various stakeholders. Government wanted to open the bank account of all the beneficiaries in order to transfer the wages directly to the account. Team checked with several banks (PNB, Canara bank, UCO Bank, and Central bank Of India) to explore the option of opening mass scale accounts. None of the banks initially agreed to lend support but finally Central Bank of India, agreed to open bank the accounts but with the condition of that it should be a No Frill Account.e-Shakti was a mass scale project and hence there was a huge requirement of manpower to create awareness , data collection and capacity building at remote areas therefore SMAARFTECH also wanted to tied up with various a third party agencies for the availability of manpower and volunteers to create awareness and capacity building in remote areas.. [Annexure 4]

Reaction of the Beneficiaries, Rural & General Mass to e-Shakti This was a much hyped project, and successful completion meant that this would create more employment opportunities as well as help in overcoming the discrepancies of MNREGA system, moreso an end of illegal earnings for intermediaries. Therefore, the general public was both curious and anxious to know about this project. It was important to meet the expectations that the project & gGovernment promised. Bihar is a multicultural, multilingual, and religiously diverse state. The communal differences were evident and some anti-elements tried to leverage on this opportunity to ensure that implementation was not smooth. Initially, the turnover was also low. Awareness and Sensitization Team was especially constituted to help the general public get them familiarize them with the new system. This team propagated the messages via mobile vans, loudspeakers, jingles, pamphlets and helpdesks in remote areas.

Success of the Pilot Project-

e-Shakti project was able to successfully implement the MNREGA by guaranteeing employment to poor, a query & grievance redressal mechanism by providing giving them banking facilities for receiving payment directly. It reached to every section of the society covered under MNREGA scheme. It was able to bring the required and much needed transparency in the system. The turn around time between the work done and wage received was significantly brought down by the new process. [Annexure 5]

The Analysis of the case Why such innovative project failede-Shakti project was a great initiative, a successful pilot project to empower the rural people. But no innovation is successful to sustain longer in the market unless it overcome its strategic, structural and behavioral issues. e-Shakti was a Process and Service innovation focused on Technology which required lot of gradual enhancement and creativity at various stages to maintain its presence at national and grass root level. But the government policies, intervention of Mr. Nandan Nilekani, CEO UID project Top management support plays an important role for enhancing creativity and innovation. In the case of e-Shakti project, top management was the government, who didn't support this innovation for the longer time, after 1 year they lost their interest and started looking it from profit motive perspective rather an innovation at growth stage. This became one of the major reasons why this innovation did not got further leverage and hence declined/collapsed."Resource availability" plays an important role on the innovation success whether counting time, funds, people or technology. Since e-Shakti was first of its kind project in India, manpower and technology was a challenge. Designing technology (Biometric machines, handheld machines, Smart Card ) suiting to the remote condition (dust, pollution, temperature) was a tough and gradual improvement process. Trained manpower on such technology was not available and hence hiring -training staff took longer time, thus adding cost and time in execution .Pilot project took longer time than expected and the company didn't focus on competitive strategy and fails with time management part. So the idea was copied and another card by the name UID, was launched. They missed the opportunity of being first mover to market.Budgeting done by Smaarftech in bidding was mainly with the objective of getting the project from government and mark its presence in e-Governance. They ignored many other factors which ultimately occurred in losses and constrained the operations. Organization missed on doing the "feasibility check" with available resources.Government & Organization had a planned process approach in moving with the implementation but it was more on paper and reflected less on field. Hence gradually becoming an unplanned process with just managing situations and circumstances to meet the deadlines and targets.In the top management committee, "Blue hat"officials initially had creativity, investment, growth and development view but as the project moved and incurred financial as well as time loss, the focus moved on the outcome rather R&D required for its growth. There were government official wearing red hat whose veto power left negative impact on the future of the project. People were more oriented towards the public image as elections were supposed to held in near future and they didn't want any problems in that part . Task complexity was high with codification of solution almost nil/unavailable and high in exception, the project demanded high R&D but so was not the case with huge budget constraints.ConclusionThe e-Shakti was dream project of Government of Bihar and if we take a look at its pilot project phase, there is no doubt of its success but success which is short lived does not foster growth in creativity. The project did not reached its maturity stage and declined before that, leaving behind lots of query, surprise on its decline. The project still has scope for revival and can come back in its full form if importance is given to the strategic issues at the Government and Organizational level.

Annexure 1

Annexure 2

2` Annexure 3

Annexure 43

Annexure 4

Annexure 5

Annexure 5