Karnataka govt pins blame on old hardware for Kaveri portal woes

Delays in updating the required technology infrastructure in sub-registrar offices is one of the key reasons for the abrupt shutdowns of the Kaveri property registration software of the Revenue Department.

According to the government, UPS and batteries installed at sub-registrar offices for servers that host the Kaveri platform were over seven years old and shut down often. Such shutdowns caused the Kaveri database to crash, affecting property registrations from few hours to few days on end.

Measures are on to address these issues by shifting the database to a central server, apart from providing new UPS and batteries to sub-registrar offices.

In a written response to a question by Congress MLC K Govindaraj, Revenue Minister R Ashoka noted that existing Kaveri platform was outdated and the process was on to develop Kaveri 2.0.

Local servers

The software run by the Stamps and Registration Department was currently dependent on both local and centralised servers. On some occasions, UPS and batteries at sub-registrar offices do not work leading to ‘abrupt shutdowns’, which in turn resulted in a ‘database crash’.

Apart from it, property registrations are hit if there is any disruption in the servers at the Directorate of Electronic Delivery of Citizen Services, which provides OTP services to Kaveri software. “Kaveri is also linked to various other platforms, and its efficiency is affected by how the linked softwares perform” he said. Bhoomi, E-Swatthu and E-Aasthi are among the software that are linked to Kaveri.

Kaveri 2.0 was under development by Centre for Smart Governance. “Since, the new version will operate from a centralised server, there won’t be any server issues once the new software is operational,” he said.

Hardware in sub-registrar offices were procured in 2013 and are outdated. The government will employ Build, Own, Operate and Transfer model to update the hardware.

High maintenance

Despite the questionable performance of Kaveri, the government has spent Rs 4.91 crore for its maintenance since 2018-19.

While Rs 3.89 crore was spent between 2018-19 to 2020-21 for the upkeep of Kaveri, Rs 1.01 crore was spent in the first five months of the 2021-22 fiscal, according to the response.