A long awaited step has finally been taken, again by the Governor’s administration by showing the administrative will to arrange to protect, conserve, retrieve and maintain the records of all the departments and offices functioning in and from the Civil Secretariat by properly digitizing it. It is not only the need of the hour but looking to the specifically different situation the state is placed in, protecting and securing the official records was very much vital. It was beyond comprehension as to why the successive Governments were adopting lackadaisical approach towards such an important issue so far. The yawning gap between the routine of issuing directives followed by reminders and fresh directives from the Committee of Secretaries and implementation mechanism, to be fair, reveals the levels of core effectiveness of directives from ‘higher levels’ in Jammu and Kashmir.
Unforeseen events and natural calamities which have already been witnessed in the shape of a blaze in a portion of the Secretariat in 2013 followed by severe floods of 2014 had particularly increasingly warranted that a mechanism should be placed in operation whereby the records could primarily be effectively ‘saved’. Moreover, substantial cost on shifting such records, papers and files at the time of half yearly Darbar Move coupled with the vulnerability of any type of records to the chances of getting worn out, torn and misplaced could be properly prevented. While an amount of Rs. 10 crore has been sanctioned for the purpose, a dead line for completing the entire exercise too has been fixed which is by the end of the year 2021 which we feel is reasonably and genuinely adequate .
This decision taken in the interests of proper functioning of the departments , easy reference and procuring of the pointed papers for official purposes in less time and with no hassles of any sort is a welcome step and must be started to be implemented in the right earnest. Proper monitoring right from the start should ensure that the exercise was undertaken in right spirit and zeal as also furnishing of monthly report of the levels of progress achieved alone could give a feel or sense whether the timeline would be honoured or jumped. Since Jammu and Kashmir is slated to become Union Territory from November 1, chances of slackness and go easy approach are expected to be minimised because of the changed scenario. Jammu and Kashmir e-Governance Agency (JaKeGA) in this respect has been given sensitive responsibility of preparing and furnishing periodic reports on financial and physical aspects of the exercise to the IT Department for further action.
The sordid part of the entire gamut of digitalisation is that for reasons better known to them, that most of the departments of the Secretariat were showing unwarranted frugality in extending the requisite co-operation to the Information and Technology Department by withholding the formal consent for being ‘considered’ in the first phase of the digitisation exercise. There could be cogent reasons based on ground limitations which is acceptable but if such reluctance was wilful which , however, has not been unveiled, then in that case, it was revealing poor and ineffective ways of running administration from the top.
Since most of the projects in Jammu and Kashmir suffer midway between start of the work and completion thereof and even earlier, due to erratic and un-assured funds flow, it is hoped that the Jammu and Kashmir e- Governance Agency would not face any hardships on this count though providing funds in a time bound manner is assured by the Government which would enable the Agency to complete the work on the project according to norms prescribed by the Government of India. It carries a sense of proper planning to start the exercise in respect of a few departments at a time as digitizing all the departments’ records simultaneously calls for a large number of manpower as also the cost thereof which is not possible to arrange. However, once completed, the exercise could result in total transformation of maintaining and preserving official records without any apprehensions of wear, tear, loss , damage or any sort of fiddling with or imperilling the same , besides introducing a new working culture , quick, accurate and perhaps more transparent in the departments of the Civil Secretariat.
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