Soon, apply for certificates via your mobile phone
The Times of India
July 18, 2011
Citizens will soon be able to apply for birth, marriage and income tax certificates through mobile phones.
The Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) is developing a service platform with the help of which the application forms required for the services can be downloaded, filled and sent back to the respective departments through the mobile phone itself.
The new system will not only reduce processing time, but also save citizens from travelling. A total of 25 priority services are expected to be launched in the first phase by November-end.
The project is being executed jointly with the Department of information technology.
"Users can simply go to the applications tab in the menu and search for the service. The required form can be downloaded and filled on the phone itself and sent back. At the back-end, the system will route it to the department concerned and users will receive a notification along with the application number for follow up. However, citizens will have to collect the documents in physical form from the respective departments," said Zia Saquib, executive director, C-DAC.
On why mobile phones were being used to execute the applications, Saquib said, "Mobiles have the potential to make public information and governance services available 'anytime, anywhere'.
Mobile services are cheaper as well as accessible in most of the rural areas. Also, the level of technical competency required to operate mobile phones is much lower than that required for operating computers."
It will take at least two weeks for the documents to be processed. About 95 per cent of the phones are expected to be compatible with the service to be provided. The government departments will be registered with the C-DAC server. "To start with, we also plan to include ration card and passport related services in the project. Adding or removing names from ration cards and passports can be done through the mobile service platform," said Saquib.