When Narendra Modi, the current Prime Minister of India, was campaigning for the top job in India he talked about the need for more government transparency. Like many, I figured this was true to a certain extent but really more about campaign politics to get more people on his side and more votes. However, a couple weeks ago the Modi government launched attendance.gov.in – a dashboard to see government employees attendance records. I guess the idea is that if government employees work for the public, then the public should be able to track if those employees are actually going to the office.
That’s a hugh step forward for government transparency, currently it’s not available for every Indian government employee but I’m assuming over time it will encompass them all. However, just because they show up doesn’t mean they are actually doing any real work. So, as more and more services go online I’m sure the system will also be able to track their efficiency as well.
The Indian government loves using paper for everything because they probably hate trees. Actually, the real reason is because when things get heated with a particular government scam, the government officials involved cam throw up their hands and say “the files have been lost.” However, by using computers like the rest of the world you can start to track the progress of the work being done and as a by-product you can have multiple backups of those “files” – crazy right?
The attendance system is just the first piece of the puzzle and I think it’s a step in the right direction.
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