17-May-2022: Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh emphasises technology and AI driven governance reforms

In an interaction with the Permanent Secretaries of the Govt of Gambia, who are currently in India to attend a one week Capacity Building Programme on Public Policy and Governance, Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Science & Technology; Minister of State (Independent Charge) Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh emphasised technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven governance, which, he said, is going to become an essential part of our future working.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given a clarion call for adopting Next Generation Reforms by bridging the gap between government and citizens. He said, in order to translate this vision into reality, several initiatives such as Secretariat Reforms, Swachhta Campaigns, Benchmarking of Governance and Services, Redressal of Public Grievances & Improving Service Delivery, recognizing meritocracy and replication of good governance practices have already been undertaken.

This is the 3rd Capacity Building Programme being organised for Permanent Secretaries of the Gambia by National Centre for Good Governance, NCGG in collaboration with MEA under ITEC. 25 participants are attending the training programme being held in New Delhi from 16th May to 21st of May. This programme is being organised under the aegis of the MoU signed between DARPG and Public Service Commission of the Gambia on 8th July, 2021 on Refurbishing Personnel Administration and Governance Reforms.

After giving a patient hearing to many of the Gambian Secretaries, Dr Jitendra Singh informed the delegates that India’s shining governance and electoral reforms are being emulated by several countries in the world. He told the secretaries to adopt technology-based reforms in administration. The Minister said, India is celebrating its 75th year of Independence as Azadi ka Amrut Mahotsav and it is the fittest occasion to underline that bilateral relations between India and Gambia have been very cordial and friendly.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, in the last nearly 8 years, India has resorted to use of technology in Governance Reforms in a massive way for achieving end-to-end service delivery without human intervention and offered to share such best practices with Gambia. He pointed out that the reforms that have been implemented through technology intervention to bring transparency in the day to day administration include implementation of e-Office, e-Leave management system, Employee Information System, Smart Performance Appraisal Report Recording Online Window (SPARROW), Aadhar enabled Biometric Attendance System (AEBAS), Pension Sanction and Payment tracking System (Bhavishya), Public Financial Management System (PFMS), Web Responsive Pensioner’s Service for pensioners, introduction of Face Recognition Technology for elderly pensioners, Family Pension to differently abled child of a deceased Government employee/Pensioner, Electronic Pension Pay Order etc.

The Minister said, the widespread adoption of e-office has created paperless offices in the Central Secretariat and enabled smooth governance functioning not only in the pandemic but also in day-to-day functioning. The organisational reforms coupled with significant reforms in Personnel Administration undertaken by the Government include Mission Karmayogi and Lateral recruitment. The Central Secretariat has adopted the initiative of increasing efficiency in Decision Making in Government wherein the channel of submission has been reduced to not more than 4 levels from 7-8 levels. The Desk officer system adopted by the Government has ensured single point of file disposal. This has shown increased efficiency in processing of cases.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, Mission Karmayogi envisages continuous capacity building of every officer through digital mode in order to prepare him for every new assignment taken up by him and at the same time also enable the authorities to scientifically choose the right officer for the right assignment. The main mantra is moving from ‘rule based to role based’ governance. Similarly, as part of reforms in the field of recruitment, the GoI has constituted the National Recruitment Agency (NRA) for conducting Common Eligibility Test (CET) in order to provide a level playing field to every job aspirant across the country, regardless of his socio-economic background, the Minister added.

The Minister said, in order to redress public grievances, there is a dedicated Centralised Public Grievances Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) online system for grievance redress. CPGRAMS facilitates citizens to lodge their grievances for redress from anywhere and anytime (24x7). The year 2021 witnessed 21 lakh Public Grievances cases being received on the CPGRAMS with 19.95 lakh cases being redressed.

Dr Jitendra Singh conveyed his best wishes to all the Senior Permanent Secretaries of The Gambia for the training programme and also for a comfortable stay in New Delhi.

Referring to the usefulness of Capacity Building training programmes, Mustapha Jawara, High Commissioner of Gambia requested Dr Jitendra Singh for more such training modules for mid-level officers besides the senior secretaries in the Gambian government. He sought specific help from the Indian government in areas like pension system, grievance redressal and e-recruitment. The Indian Minister agreed to extend all help and added that the best practices in other governance areas will also be shared with the African partner.

2-May-2022: National Open Access Registry (NOAR) goes live successfully

National Open Access Registry (NOAR) has successfully gone live from 1st May 2022. NOAR has been designed as an integrated single window electronic platform accessible to all stakeholders including open access participants, traders, power exchanges, national/regional/state load dispatch centres for electronic processing of short-term open access application thereby automating the administration of the short-term open access in inter-state transmission system.

The NOAR platform shall act as a repository of information related to short term open access in inter-state transmission including standing clearance issued by RLDCs or SLDCs and short-term open access granted to the open access customers etc. and make such information available to the stakeholders online. Payment gateway provided for making payments and integrated with NOAR shall facilitate financial accounting and tracking of short-term open access transactions.

 National Load Despatch Centre (NLDC) operated by Power System Operation Corporation Limited (POSOCO) has been designated as the nodal agency for implementation and operation of NOAR. NOAR would be the key to facilitate faster electricity markets and enable integration of Renewable Energy (RE) resources into the grid. NOAR will enable seamless market participation by the open access consumer with easier and faster access to the short-term electricity market, comprising of about 10% of all India demand.

NOAR is part of the Ministry of Power, Government of India’s initiative and the required regulatory framework has been notified by the CERC through operationalization of the 5th Amendment Regulation of Open Access in inter- State Transmission.

24-Mar-2022: Ministry of Power urges all ministries to deploy Electric Vehicles into the fleet of official vehicles

Ministry of Power has requested all the Ministries in Government of India and the State Governments to join the initiative on transformative electric mobility and advise their respective Departments to shift their fleet of official vehicles from present Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) based Vehicles to Electric Vehicles.

Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) through its wholly owned subsidiary CESL (Convergence Energy Services Limited), undertook consultations with State Transport Utilities (STUs), State Governments, Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), NITI Aayog etc. to aggregate demand of 5,450 buses for deployment on Operating expenses (OPEX) basis across 9 major cities in India (having population over 4 million). CESL floated a unified tender on 20th January 2022 towards aggregation of e-buses. In respect of Electric 3 Wheelers (E3W), CESL has floated a tender to aggregate demand for one lakh E3W as per the modified Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid &) Electric Vehicles (FAME) Phase-II scheme. The aggregation of E3W has resulted into price reduction up to 22% in comparison to the retail segment.

EESL through CESL has received an aggregated demand of 930 numbers of electric 4 Wheelers (e4Ws) from various Government departments at Central and State level. Further, 25,000 electric two wheelers have been aggregated for Government employees of Andhra Pradesh. Also, CESL has aggregated a demand of 82,000 electric three wheelers of various categories.  EESL has decided that it would do aggregation of demand only and would not get into financing the EVs in any capacity.

12-Aug-2021: Power Ministry advises Central Government offices to switch over to Prepaid Smart Meters on priority

Ministry of Power has issued an advisory to all Central Ministries of the Government to direct organisations under their administrative control to ensure switch over to Prepaid Smart Meters on priority. As part of the same process, the ministries have also been asked to issue all enabling orders in this regard. This follows a clarification issued by the Ministry of Finance enabling all Central Ministries and Central Departments to make advance payments for pre-paid metered electricity without insisting on any Bank Guarantees, while at the same time ensuring proper accounting arrangements.

Prepaid Smart metering in all Government Departments would not only go a long way in ensuring the commitment of the Government in bringing DISCOMs back on the path of financial sustainability, promotion of energy efficiency but would also serve as a model for emulation by States for defining similar such mechanisms that support prepayment of the electricity dues by their own Departments.

Government of India is committed towards providing uninterrupted, reliable and quality power supply to all the consumers, for which an operationally efficient and financially sustainable power sector is a must. DISCOMs are often termed as the most important, but the weakest link in the power sector value chain, as their poor financial health at the bottom of the value chain has far reaching negative impacts upstream. Apart from the operational inefficiencies that cause financial losses, mounting electricity dues of the Government Departments, including the Central & State Governments; Urban & Rural Local bodies; and Government Boards and Corporations due to delayed and inadequate payments for electricity usage also causes cash flow distress in DISCOMs. The interest burden on the additional working capital availed by DISCOMs to tide over the shortfalls further creates an inflationary pressure on their costs, thereby placing further stress on their viability. Estimates obtained from the States suggest the outstanding Government department dues to be Rs 48,664 crore at the end of FY2020-21, a value that is a colossal ~9% of the annual power sector turnover.

To improve the operational efficiency and financial sustainability of the Distribution sector, Government of India has approved the Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme - A Reforms-Based and Results-Linked Scheme. The Scheme seeks to transform the existing DISCOMs into making them operationally efficient and financially sustainable. One of the path breaking interventions under the Scheme is the plan to install prepaid Smart meters to all electricity consumers except agricultural consumers in a phased manner for which almost half of the Scheme outlay has been committed. Priority has been accorded to the prepaid Smart meter installation in all the Government Departments including those of the Central & State Governments; Urban & Rural Local bodies; and Government Boards and Corporations with a view to ensure that the Government departments properly budget and pay for the electricity services as and when used.

10-Aug-2021: Measures taken to promote Hydro Power in India

The Government had taken several policy initiatives in the past for hydropower development in the country viz., National Electricity Policy 2005, National Tariff Policy 2016, National Rehabilitation & Resettlement Policy 2007 and Right to Fair Compensation & Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act 2013.

Subsequently, the Government has also issued measures to promote Hydro Power Sector on 8th March, 2019 under which the following provisions have been made:-

1. Declaring Large Hydro Projects (>25 MW) as Renewable Energy source.
2. Tariff rationalization measures for bringing down hydropower tariff.
3. Budgetary Support for Flood Moderation/ Storage Hydro Electric Projects (HEPs).
4. Budgetary Support to Cost of Enabling Infrastructure i.e., roads/bridges.

Subsequently, the Hydro Purchase Obligation (HPO) trajectory, for the period 2021-22 to 2029-30 has also been notified by the Government on 29.01.2021.

These measures would be particularly beneficial for development of hydro projects, in hilly regions/ States, which are often located in remote and far-flung areas and require development of extensive associated infrastructure such as roads, bridges etc. for transportation of heavy, large sized equipment & machinery to the project site.