Karnataka MLAs frown as govt discards file tracking portal

An online portal that tracked movement of files in government departments has been taken down by the Bommai government, angering legislators who say they are having a hard time finding out the status of their pleas now.

The Sachivalaya Vahini portal — which was put in place in October 2011 under the Online Digital Government Communication (ODGC) project — showed where and with whom every file and letter received by the government was.

The Sachivalaya Vahini's main beneficiaries were legislators, who are overloaded with requests from their constituents to keep tabs on tapals, a government parlance that refers to letters or mail.

Personal assistants of MLAs would find out the officer concerned handling the file and follow up.

The government has said that it is coming up with a new citizen portal that will replace Sachivalaya Vahini, but legislators are unhappy.

“Our PAs are the ones who track these and they’re not able to get any information,” Nelamangala MLA Dr K Srinivasamurthy, who raised this in the Assembly, said.

As an example, he gave the example of the e-khata issue in his constituency. “There are properties that aren't able to pay tax because they aren’t being given e-khata,” he said, adding that his staff is not able to track letters sent to the government on behalf of citizens.

“Sachivalaya Vahini was closed as physical files have no meaning now because of the implementation of e-Office,” Additional Chief Secretary (e-Governance) Rajeev Chawla told DH.

Under e-Office, all files are scanned and uploaded onto the system for further transactions. Besides saving reams of paper, e-Office cuts manual movement of files and ensures speedy clearances. All secretariat offices have moved to e-Office.

From October 1, deputy commissioners, zilla panchayat chief executives and others started moving all files to government secretaries through e-Office only.

Former IT minister Priyank Kharge, who pushed the use of e-Office when he was in office, said ‘inexperienced’ PAs struggle to find out the status of files. “On top of that, there's a black box and we don't know what's happening now,” the Chittapur MLA said.

Seema KP, director, e-Office project, said the new portal is under development. “We have requested the NIC to provide the application programming interface,” she said.

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