New age working models can transform India through digital inclusion and citizen empowerment and result in more equitable growth
As we reach the milestone of six years of Digital India, we find more and more people daily using some form of a digital service, whether digital payments or COWIN vaccinations. The pace of digital transformation, especially in the post-pandemic year, has been phenomenal.
The number of registered users on Digilocker has gone up from 37 million in April 2020 to 66 million today - an increase of almost 78 per cent. The number of registered users on UMANG has gone up by 66 per centfrom 19.7 million in April 2020 to 33 million. MyGov has seen an increase of almost 65 per centin the number of registered users from 11.1 million to 18.3 million. On Social media platforms, MyGov has seen an increase of 216 per cent on YouTube subscribers, 162 per cent on Instagram followers, 125 per cent on Facebook followers, 138 per cent on LinkedIn and 37 per cent on Twitter. Poshan Tracker, a project that was launched in March 2021 to get data on nutrition and health from around 1.4 million Aanganwadicenters is regularly getting updates from more than 9.5 crore beneficiaries. The volume of digital payments has exceeded Rs 4 lakh crores from around Rs 100 crores in 2016.
Our investments in building the JAM platform - Jandhan- Aadhaar-Mobile— has not only enabled financial inclusion but also proved to be extremely useful in enabling money transfer through DBT to the poor when they needed it the most. The government has been able to transfer more than 16.79 lakh crore directly to thebank accounts of beneficiaries.
Almost 10 crore farmers have benefited through PM Kisan Scheme and this year we have had a record procurement of wheat at an MSP price of Rs 19750 per MT - almost 432.58 lakh MT of wheat was procured and more than 85000 crore was transferred to bank accounts of farmers.
When we look back at the year that was, one notices a key difference in the way these projects have been executed. Most team members ae not physically present in the office. Work goes on most through virtual meetings, collaborating through digital tools like VC rooms, e-Office, Open Forge, E-mail and instant messaging apps. Almost 300-plus team members from 50-plus cities, towns, and villages collaborate virtually to deliver projects on time and with quality.
There are project-wise breakout rooms. The day begins with team meetings to review work done and tasks on hand and members then move to their breakout rooms after the mandatory video attendance. These virtual rooms function just like adjoining rooms in a physical office. One can seamlessly move from one room to the other without needing to click any link or login again. VPN is used as and when needed to securely access e-office and data center environments. There are breakout rooms for meetings and conferences also. There is also a cafeteria room where team members can have lunch together in a relaxed atmosphere. There is also a water-cooler point where senior management is not allowed and that provides a convenient outlet for stress-venting. In such a remote working environment, productivity has gone up by almost 30 per cent.
Work From Anywhere has significant savings for everyone. Team members save on commute time and they can add almost 1-2 hours in daily work time. The number of people taking leave has gone down Work from Home has really helped female employees continuing their work without the need to take time off due to domestic responsibilities. We have team members who delayed their entitled maternity leave as they could manage work and their health working remotely. It also helped in savings as many team members terminated their lease rentals and moved to their villages and family homes and continued working.
This shift in work culture has many unseen benefits also. One has realised it is possible to hire good quality resources at very reasonable costs since it obviates the need for relocation. Remote working is also having an impact on Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities as more companies resort to WFH and remote working. This is resulting in more disposable incomes in these cities and will result in growth in the services sector in these areas and the creation of more jobs.
Digital India and the new age working models have the potential to not only transforming India through digital inclusion and citizen empowerment but will also result in more equitable growth.
(The writer is CEO, MyGov and NeGD and MD, Digital India Corporation, Government of India. The views expressed are personal.)