The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) is setting up an entity, called Digital India Corporation (DIC) for leading and guiding the implementation of the Digital India programme.
DIC is supposed to provide strategic support to central or state government ministries and departments of Centre/States in digital initiatives.
DIC will provide leadership and support to the Government of India through MeitY, to steer and anchor Digital India and all related policy and implementation initiatives. DIC is also supposed to provide strategic support to central or state government ministries and departments for crafting progressive e-governance strategies, with the objective of promoting accountability, efficiency, efficacy and transparency.
DIC will source technically skilled manpower from the market, as well as from inside government, and make the manpower available to different central and state government ministries and departments on a charge basis to meet their hardware, software, network, cyber security, standards, quality and testing or any other requirement in the ICT domain.
In order to develop human resources within the government for successful implementation of ICT projects/schemes, the new organisation will also establish the National e-Governance Academy and put in place an institutional mechanism for capacity building of government and its agencies. This includes assessment and evolution of suitable training packages/modules for capacity building.
DIC’s responsibilities covers boosting digital transactions including digital payments, promoting participatory governance and citizen engagement across the government through various platforms including social media and evolving models for empowerment of citizens through digital initiatives.
It will do so by capacity building for e-Governance projects, promoting best practises, encouraging Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) and nurturing innovation and technology.
DIC will collaborate and create partnerships with the industry, to evolve revenue based models for service delivery to ensure autonomy and viability of the organisation in the long run.
MeitY has also restructured Media Lab Asia, which was set up as not-for-profit research and development organisation to develop relevant, sustainable technologies and solutions and bring them to the daily lives of people.
Read the press release here.