Virtual village

8216;8216;Valukad has been chosen to become the first e-gram because all our records, especially, land records, are in order. It was easy to feed them into the data pool,8217;8217; says Dilip Bhatt, Talati or administrative head of the gram panchayat of Valukad.

You would think the Talati8217;s office would be a smelly place with bundles of papers tied in red cloth hanging from everywhere. But walk into the office of Talati of Valukad, the place is almost paperless. The computer and dot matrix printer that has been recently installed recently has become the pride of this nondescript village.

The villagers are obviously excited. Till now, for even minor work or queries the villagers had to go 22 kms to Ghogha, the taluka headquarters. 8216;8216;We do not have to go to the Taluka Panchayat office to procure certificates, records and application forms anymore. It costs at least Rs 60 to Rs 100 if you do not get proper transport and it is not always possible to get the work done in a day. Things will change now,8217;8217; says Bhalabhai, a villager.

Sarpanch Pushottam Bhalia says that with the taluka head quarters 22 kms away, few villagers bothered to go there to receive any government grants. 8216;8216;The procedure was tedious and often there was corruption. Who would spend Rs 150 to avail Rs 500 for a mother with a new born baby?8217;8217; says Bhalia.

The Talati can now issue computer printouts of land records, certificates of property tax, income, birth and death, BPL, caste and character certificates. Villagers can also apply for and get scholarships for deserving rural students and Rs 1,500 grant for the girl child under Dikri Rudi Sachi Mudi scheme and receive the money without having to go out.

Also, with GSWAN, kerosene and food grains lifting information, health bulletins, training and employment will also be available for interested villagers.

The software on which the e-gram runs has been developed by the National Informatics Centre NIC under the Union Ministry of Information Technology. 8216;8216;We have used Gujarati and the programme is totally self explanatory,8217;8217; says D K Chauhan, District Informatics Officer of NIC.

The database about the villagers has been collected through an exhaustive questionnaire with 40 points including caste, occupation and date of birth, police cases etc.

Another benefit to the villagers is that computerisation is eliminating corruption. By just giving his name, a villager can demand details on the computer screen on his property or water tax, how much he has paid and what is due.

Says District Development Officer Mona Kandhahar, who is spearheading the project. 8216;8216;E-grams will be the strength of Gujarat in the coming years. It will revolutionise basic administration at the gram panchayat levels. The data that is being gathered into the e-grams will not help in local administration but also in preparing election cards, providing health facilities, census etc,8217;8217; she says.

Valukad is the first of 31 e-grams in Ghogha and Umrala talukas of Bhavnagar district where the project will be implemented. Villages with a population of more than 5,000 will have a separate computer while five villages with less population will be clubbed to form a joint e-gram.

Interestingly, only Valukad is being provided hardware and other infrastructure by the state government as it is a pilot project. In the rest of the 30 villages, private donors are paying for the computers, printers and the cabins where they will be installed. Much of the funds come from Muljibhai Vasrambhai Dhamelia, a rich merchant of Rajapara village who is also the president of the diamond traders association in Bhavnagar.

Valukad, as Gujarat8217;s first e-gram, will be inaugurated by chief minister Narendra Modi on November 3.