HYDERABAD: In tune with the trying times of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Telangana government has hit upon an innovative concept for contactless governance. As part of its initiatives to reduce physical contact while simultaneously expedite the movement of files, the K Chandrasekhar Rao-led state government has taken a crucial decision to implement the e-office system. The contactless e-office system will be implemented in the State Secretariat besides other heads of departments and government offices at the State level.

The process for the new system has already been initiated even as the authorities are intending to put the e-office system into practice from second week of July. Accordingly, all the departments have been ordered to chalk out a master database of all government employees and collect the digital signatures of the authorities concerned. This is in addition to installing necessary hardware and software for a hassle-free functioning of the system.

As part of the system, each department has been asked to appoint a nodal officer besides a technical assistant. To start with, the e-office system will be implemented in crucial departments of Revenue, Disaster Management, Excise, Commercial Taxes and Stamps and Registrations. Subsequently, it will be made applicable to other departments after reviewing the efficacy and feasibility of the system in its implementation in the preliminary phase.

“The e-office system was designed as part of Digital India programme by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and has been under partial implementation in some departments as well as district collectorates. The proposals for expanding the e-office operations to all departments have been there, pending for a long time. It is just that the current COVID-19 scenario has forced several departments to expedite the process which was kickstarted a few weeks back. This will minimise physical contact and also improve transparency and effective movement of files,” sources in Telangana IT department said.

In view of the spurt in coronavirus cases, government departments have already been directed to function with 50 per cent or less manpower. As a result, most of the government employees are either working from home or attending office on alternate days while a few others have been asked to work on a weekly basis.