Experts criticize UP Govt's latest IT order

Uttar Pradesh (UP), the next IT destination of India.

Certainly not if the recent government orders with their stress on

centralization and discouragement to competition are any indication. The orders

are reflective of how sustained efforts are being made to take the state many

steps behind in IT, the debacle of the Cybertron software park notwithstanding.

The state government, through its order No. 505/78

IT-2001 dated April 30, has set up a six member committee, ostensibly to ensure

greater transparency.  It is also an effort to speed up IT growth by

ensuring that departments, which need their own software would first study what

is already available and submit their report to this committee. The committee

would then decide the feasibility of the software to be developed.

In other words, the final authority on departmental

application software would vest with the committee comprising Principal

Secretary (IT); Joint Secretary (E-governance), government of India: Director,

UP State Informatics; MD, UPDESCO; MD, UPCL; and Secretary of the department

concerned.

By an earlier order taken at a board meeting of UP

Electronics Corporation held at UPDESCO on April 12, it was decided that the

government would be requested to do away with the decentralized purchase of

hardware. The meeting held that all proposals for computerization of government

departments should be referred to the IT and electronics departments which would

then give it the final shape. The two departments would then allocate the orders

to UPLC, UPDESCO or NIC.

The earlier policy for hardware procurement was an open

one whereby a government department could purchase from any vendor with the

limitation that purchases above Rs 50 lakh would be referred to a group headed

by the APC.

Remarked a senior IT expert, "These steps are

retrograde for the development of the IT sector in UP. The policies discourage

competition. Apart from encouraging red tapism it will discourage local players

in both the hardware and software segments. The move is at complete variance

with those being followed in IT-savvy states like Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh

where the mantra is total decentralization."

More importantly, the recent decisions raise the vital

question of what exactly is the role of the IT department--to make policies or

purchase?

(CNS)