Govt accelerates e-governance drive with ambitious digital transformation efforts

Kathmandu, Dec. 22: Until a few years ago, many of us had to stand for hours in long queues on the streets of Kathmandu Valley to apply for an IPO of companies and even to claim the right shares. 

But with the change in ICT sector and initiatives to upgrade this system to online, the number of people joining the stock market has increased exponentially.

According to CDS and Clearing Limited, 6.451 million de-mat (de-materialised) accounts have been opened so far.  The banks and financial institutions have a system in place to buy primary market shares from home through the 'e-ASWA' system brought in collaboration with other bodies. Trade Management System (TMS) has also been developed for buying and selling securities in the secondary market. 

Likewise, it has now become history that you had to be at the Company Registrar Office either to register or to make an annual update of the company's status, carrying a stack of files. 

The company registration process would only begin after you submitted a heap of documents such as the letter of administration, rules, and details of all company shareholders (in the case of a public company), and proof of citizenship or other documents of all directors.

 This situation has now ended. The registration process begins after scanning the certified details and uploading them from your own computer. The company is registered after the concerned office verifies it. After registration, everything from company updates to online work is done digitally. However, there is still a provision to go to the office to get the certificate or get an updated certificate. 

The company registrar’s office has also started the digital signature system since last July. Using it, a government official anywhere in the world can provide his/her authentication by means of digital signature. 

This system, implemented voluntarily, is being prepared to be made mandatory in case of registration of public companies in the first phase, and gradually be implemented for the registration of private companies, said Assistant Registrar Basanta Bahadur Khatri of the Office of the Company Registrar, Tripureshoar. 

He said once this system is fully implemented, service recipients don't need to go to the company office for any company-related work.

Progress in e-governance 

Ramesh Sharma Paudyal, Director General for the Department of Information Technology, under the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, said, “We have realised that some important works had been done in the IT and e-governance part in the last decade. This has brought about extensive improvements in the areas of public services and payment systems.”

This is proven by the fact that Nepal secured 119th position in the E-governemnt Development Index (EGDI) out of all UN member nations securing 0.05781 point for the year 2024. This update is being made in every two years. In 2022, Nepal was in 125th rank. The UN e-government survey highlights a global trend of increased investment in digital government technologies and infrastructure. 

According to Paudyal, over the past few years, banks and financial institutions licensed by Nepal Rastra Bank have revolutionised mobile banking services. The use of 'QR -based' payment for cashless transactions has increased extensively in recent times. 

This system has not only reduced cash transactions but also payments made through debit cards and credit cards, he added. 

Foreign switches had to be used for payments made through debit and credit cards, and money was sent abroad for each transaction and these have also decreased tremendously. However, 'QR revolution' has ended the situation of money flowing out of banks and financial institutions in transactions. 

There is no need to go to the relevant place to make any kind of payment, from drinking water, electricity, internet, telephone, to tax payment.

DG Paudyal said, apart from banks, information technology has brought many changes in public administrative services. Management Information System (MIS) has now been implemented in almost all government offices. This has reduced the time taken for service delivery. Payments by government agencies have also gone to e-payment. 

However, the hassle of having to submit documents provided by one government agency to another government agency and manually uploading details, or scanning documents and uploading them still exists. 

“The system of having to upload them repeatedly from office to office and verifying details manually is still in place, he said. We must stop this trend of verifying our citizenship certificates already verified by one specific government office because we must accept and believe the change brought about by IT," said Paudyal. 

DG Paudyal said the concept of digital governance that has come up lately is to end public hassle that service recipients have to undergo. "Until now, the idea was to use ICT in government service delivery. Now onwards, we will move from ICT to IoT (Internet of Things), which means delivery of government service to the house of service seekers through the use of internet,” he claimed. 

According to him, lately a concept has developed that citizens should not go to government offices, but the government should provide services to the citizens giving access to their gadgets. "We have started calling this digital governance and transformation from e-governance," he said.

According to the same concept, the Digital Nepal Framework is also being revised by the Ministry, said Paudyal.  

 He said that until now government services were operated according to the objective of e-governance. Its objective was to use information technology in government office work. However, people had to reach the office physically to get the services. He said, "The journey ahead is towards digitisation and digitalisation of the public services. The objective is not require people to go to government offices, but to bring government services to the houses of the people."

DG Paudyal said the concept of integrating all public services through the 'Nagarik App' launched by the government is exemplary. However, several government services are yet to be enlisted and synchronised in this app.  One good example of this app, now, is that every citizen when gets logged in to this app, can easily get their personal PAN number within few hours just by uploading their citizenship certificates and photo after it gets verified by the authorities.  

Practice of e-governance services   

According to DG Paudyal, e-governance services have now been applied to different public offices like the Department of Immigration where people can get e-visa processing  online and even payment for the service, issuance of smart license although its use is yet to come into use in real sense, embossed number plate with planning to surveil  all vehicles plying across the country, company registrar’s office, and even issuance of press accreditation card for journalists  online, etc., are  few examples of application of e-governance. "But government's dream for digitalisation of all these services may still take some years to have all kinds of government services in the hands and internet of public," said Paudyal. 

Despite the accessibility and sustainability of technology, it is not possible to assume that any technology has been successful. Stakeholders say that it depends on how efficient such use is in terms of time and cost. For example, there is access to radio and television in every household, but people have shifted to internet technology for information and entertainment. Voice calls are accessible everywhere, but people have started talking through means like WhatsApp and Viber. Experts said that despite accessibility, the sustainability of any technology depends on the efficiency.

Bijay Limbu Senihang, CEO of Vairav Tech and cybersecurity expert, said that it is true that the country is in pre-digital transformation era, and it is easy to talk about e-governance and digitalisation, but in real sense the government itself is unknown about which sector should be steered into complete digitalisation phase. 

"Although many things have already been set up in the IT and communication sectors from the government, the central government still lacks specific prioritisation in the IT sector to make one particular sector as fully digital," said Limbu. 

For example, tourism, health, agriculture and industry have huge potential in terms of revenue generation, but the government has not prioritised these sectors to make them fully digital so that people from across the country get service anytime and from anywhere in the world.

Another problem in IT and e-governance is that government hurries in launching and bringing any new technology in Nepal and testing it in public service sectors like in passport, driving license and industry and company registration office, but the digital system adopted in particular offices lacks sustainability of operation for 24 hours. Let's say if anyone visits such offices, they may not get the service in digital platform, courtesy server down or system down," said Limbu. 

"It seems that there is a lack of a detailed framework and implementation plan from the government regarding the type of digital transformation required in sectors such as education, healthcare, insurance, transportation, industry, and agriculture in our country," he said.  

As a result, our government offices providing public services often appear disorganised and chaotic, he said. 

In Nepal, technologies are being implemented without proper infrastructure, laws, and policies in place. For example, the national identity card has been introduced, but the current constitution does not recognise it as equivalent to citizenship. Therefore, its implementation remains uncertain, said Limbu.