2. India Post & ICT Evolution: ICT4D 0.0
Established in 1688 as Company Mail by Warren Hastings.
By 1861, there were 889 post offices handling nearly 43 million letters and
over 4.5 million newspapers annually.
Posts and Telegraphs Departments merged in 1914.
Application for the Digital Divide
Physical Assess:
On an average 2 km, a post office is present in rural areas.
Informacy:
Several services launched, from Telegram to Speed post
Information illiteracy:
Still rural people are unaware about the application process of different
services.
3. ICT4D 1.0 and India Post
Multipurpose counter machines with computers were introduced in post offices in
1991 to:
1. Improve customer service and increase revenue and staff productivity
2. Make the post office the focal point for delivery of state social-security
programs
3. Enable the electronic networking of about 1,30,000 rural post offices
4. Enable paperless transactions for mail, postal banking and insurance services
5. Enable tracking and tracing of articles intended for delivery
25,000 departmental post offices (out of 25,464) have been computerized from
2006–2007 to 2011–2012. A plan (costing Rs.1877.2 crore) has been formulated to
computerize rural post offices
4. Strengths of India Post Network
• Rural post office personnel drawn from local communities
• Trusted by the local people
• Have valuable information capital on the local communities
• Even the last person at the remotest village is within the reach of India Post
• Rich experience of delivering financial and retail services in addition to the mail
operations
Rural ICT Programme:
Plan to connect all the post offices including those in rural areas on
appropriate ICT platform by September 2012
Field testing is planned in November 2010
Adequate financial resources have already been provided to India Post
7. The IT Modernization project, intends to achieve the following:
Wider reach to the Indian populace through more customer interaction
channels
Better customer service
Growth through new lines of business
IT enablement of business processes and support functions
The key objectives of the India Post 2012 project are:
1. Modernization and computerization of all Post offices in the country
including Branch Post offices in rural areas, mail offices and
administrative and other offices;
2. Development of scalable, integrated and modular software covering all
operations of the Department of Posts such as Mail Operations, Postal
Banking, Insurance, Finance and HR;
3. Establishment of required IT Infrastructure including Data centre, Wide
Area Network (WAN) based networking of the departmental post offices;
and
4. Deployment of Rural Information Communication Technology (Rural
8.
9. Project Overview:
1.
In August 2010 Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved the ‘INDIA
POST 2012’ IT Modernization project with a total outlay of 1877.2 crores.
2.
As part of 11th five year plan, this IT modernization project has been
undertaken in two phases.
Phase: 1
Post offices up to double handed levels were supplied with IT hardware
Phase: 2
The program has been built on 3 cornerstones as follows:
To establish Data
Centre / disaster
recovery centres to
house all transactions
and data
Nationwide
networking of all post
offices including rural
post offices
Supply of computer
hardware to
noncomputerized post
offices, mail offices and
rural post offices
14. India Post’s primary stakeholders are its customers, employees and the
Government of India.
1. Customers can exercise their choice as there are alternatives. Therefore
retention of the existing customers is crucial as also attracting new customers.
2. The employees are India Posts main strength. The employees have supported
IT induction and the new initiatives. However, they could be a threat if change
is not effectively managed.
3. Government of India as owner has been continuously supporting India Post.
It has also supported India Post in its plans to modernize, expand and enrich
its product and services mix.
15. Revenue Model of DoP
The DoP will have:
Increased revenue through higher market shares in the existing and
newly introduced IT enabled products and services.
Better decision making and operational planning due to availability of
information in timely manner
Potential reduction in the transaction cost and availability of manpower
for redeployment in marketing and other revenue generating capabilities
Increased productivity and accountability
17. Conclusion: Contribution to Development
Benefits for Customers:
Better financial inclusion for the common man in the rural and semi-urban
locations at par with the urban locations, through mobile remittances, mobile
banking, mobile insurance etc.
Effective and transparent delivery of social security and employment guarantee
schemes
Increased consistency and reliability in mail, parcels and logistics delivery system
Benefits for DoP:
in line with global standards
Significant enhancement in revenue & market shares as multitude of products will
be improved and new products/ services will be launched (e.g. eGovernance, Rural
ICT)
Better decision making and operational planning due to availability of
management information in a timely manner
Potential reduction in the transaction cost and availability of manpower for
redeployment in marketing and other revenue generating capabilities
Increased productivity and accountability
Benefits for Employees:
Employees will have an opportunity to learn, build and enhance new skills and
expertise
Reduction in manual work which will result in enhanced productivity levels
Opportunity to deliver enhanced IT enabled services to their customers leading to a
significant reduction in customer complaints