Digital Legislatures

Propaganda blitzkrieg of parties and candidates in the Assam Assembly elections on the social media reflect the use of digital technology in electioneering. The euphoria of using digital technology, however, is not been carried to the floor of the House to expedite the automation of the State Assembly. Assam is way behind many States in the use of information technology for e-governance solution for the State Legislative Assembly towards making it a paperless House. The programme of 'Digital India' includes e-Vidhan or National e-Vidhan App (NeVA) -- aimed at making paperless Assembly as a 'Mission Mode Project'. It aims at providing e-Governance solution for Legislative Assembly and has two components- e-Assembly and e-Constituency. Under e-Assembly, the process involved in working of the House is automated while e-Constituency is for the legislators to manage their constituencies through the application of information-and-communication technology. The Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly became the first digital legislature in the country in 2014 through the application of e-Vidhan with financial assistance from the Central government. Himachal's success story was followed by the Central government empowering the Ministry of Parliament in 2015 to promote and roll out e-Vidhan re-designated as NeVA in all the States and Union Territories with the Legislatures on the line of the Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly. Over the years, States like Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Goa, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra have made significant progress towards transforming their state assemblies into e-Assembly.

The project has been articulated on the realties of prevailing system of law-making process being time consuming and expensive. The prevailing practice in most Assemblies is paper-based and requires the legislators to give notices on questions and other in writing on paper while their electors and other residents of their Constituencies are also required to write on paper to bring the issues to the notice of their elected representatives. NeVA outlines the "potential areas of computerization, making the State Legislatures paperless by electronic laying of all the papers on the table of the House, design development and implementation of the standard NeVA product, connectivity to all the State Government Departments, connectivity to National Informatics Centre Network/ National Knowledge Network (NICNET/ NKN) for NeVA deployment, mail/ Internet empowerment and other network services to the Legislatures of States/ UTs, ICT Service to the Members of the State Legislatures, Guidelines for Indian Government Websites (GIGW) compliant websites for all the State Legislatures using common framework." The Public Investment Board Memorandum of the Ministry has highlighted the cost-benefit analysis of the e-Vidhan and NeVA. "It is an eco-friendly project for public good. e-Vidhan was implemented in 2014 in Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly at a total cost of Rs.8.12 crore. As per the estimates made available by Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly, before implementation of e-Vidhan, their annual consumption of papers alone was to the tune of Rs 5.08 crore, which is equivalent to 6096 Trees. If the entire overhead cost including printing, postage, manpower etc. is also included, the expenditure for running the Assembly was Rs15 crore annually. As such, the project paid more than itself within a short span of two years." It further states that If the data provided by Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly is extrapolated for all States/ UTs, an amount of Rs 340 crore approximately, as against the project cost of Rs 673.94 crore, would be saved annually due to implementation of NeVA. This explains the importance of transforming the paper-based Assemblies into digital legislatures under NeVa as an economically viable and environment-friendly solution. Besides going paperless, the e-Assembly will provide easy access to question and answers, papers laid on the floor of the House including bills, reports, debates, and discussion by legislators in the House to citizens which is vital for making democracy vibrant. The access to information will facilitate informed debates and discussion among the general public which will make the important stakeholders in contributing to the democratic process of opinion building and decision making crucial for legislative function of the assemblies. The ICT solutions under e-constituency for the legislators can facilitate quick processing of files in various departments for development activities undertaken in their respective constituencies. It can also make monitoring of projects taken up with fund provided under the MLA Local Area Development Schemes. Improved communication between legislators and residents of Constituencies will lead to quick and real time feedback on the actual progress of the projects and facilitate timely intervention to remove the bottlenecks to prevent corruption and inordinate delay in execution. The sessions of the 15th Assam Assembly will be held in the new building that was inaugurated on the last day of the last Budget Session of the 14th Assembly. The newly elected Assembly will have its proceedings in the new building, and it is hoped that rolling out NeVA will be expedited. Easy access of the citizens to internet will be critical to achieve the objectives of a paperless House.