Results from a study of impact of e-government projects in India

The paper presents the results from an assessment study of eight e-government projects from India. The assessment framework measured the total value delivered by a project to various stakeholders on three dimensions: (a) cost to clients for accessing services; (b) perception of quality of service and governance; and (c) agency cost and revenue. Data was collected from randomly selected users encapsulating their experience of using the computerized and manual systems. Impact was estimated as the difference between the rating of the computerized and the manual systems. Citizens indicated an overwhelming preference for computerized service delivery. The number of trips required to be made to the concerned offices reduced significantly and waiting time came down by nearly fifty percent. Overall impact showed wide variations across projects. Of the seven agencies where corruption was reported in the manual system, five services saw significant reduction through computerization but the impact was marginal in three projects. Government of India has adopted the framework used in this study to assess the impact of 40 projects implemented at the national, state and local levels. Paper discusses the implications of the results for further development of e-government projects in India and identifies the limitations of the study.