Questions/Answers

Madhya Pradesh with a population of ~72.6 million residents and 308,000 Sq KM area is the second largest State of India. It has largest Tribal population (~26 million) amongst all States. Article 41 of Constitution of India directs the State to provide assistance to its citizens in case of vulnerability, poverty, old age, sickness and disablement & in other cases of undeserved want. Social Security is largest & most complex sector in terms of number of beneficiaries (~50 million), geographical reach (~90,000 habitations), number of institutions, engagement of human resources & involvement of multiple departments & local bodies. Government of Madhya Pradesh(GoMP) strives for welfare, social protection & social security of all its residents and is implementing several Social Security and assistance schemes to facilitate compliance of the directives of constitution and support dignity of life for vulnerable & underprivileged. Annual outlay of the schemes is ~200 Million INR. Conventional system of implementation of Schemes was demand driven, reactive and plagued with several issues as the implementation was manual and decentralized. Several eligible and deserving persons could not get the social security benefits as they lacked capacity & courage of approaching the government machinery for sanction of benefit. Initiative involves design, development and implementation of a ICT based system to transform the system and facilitate switch from "Demand-based & reactive model of Governance" to "Proactive & Entitlement-based model of Governance". It ensures timely & hassle-free sanction of benefits of social security schemes to beneficiaries as per eligibility & timely disbursal of benefit using Direct Benefit Transfer. Initiative has transformed the social security system and is benefitting ~50 million residents Old Age, Widows/deserted, Mentally Retarded Persons, Persons with Multiple Disabilities, Persons with Disabilities and population living Below the Poverty Line (BPL) & belonging to tribal, disadvantaged/ vulnerable sections of society

Objective of initiative is to ensure credible compliance of Article 41 of Constitution of India that directs the State to ensure social security and assistance to its citizens in case of vulnerability, poverty, old age, sickness and disablement & in other cases of undeserved want. 1. To undertake paradigm shift of governance Model from Demand-driven & Reactive Model to Proactive, Inclusive & Entitlement-based model of governance. 2. To transform processes involved in sanction & disbursal of benefits and make them transparent, discretion-less, hassle-free & beneficiary oriented. 3. Leverage technologies like Data-Mash-up & Predictive Computing to ensure universalization of Social Security. Mash-up databases like State Population Register, State Register of PwDs, State Register of families living under Below Poverty Line. Predict & identify citizens: a. who are technically eligible for benefit of social security but are NOT getting benefit. b. who are likely to become technically eligible for social security after two months. c. existing beneficiaries who have become eligible for benefit of scheme with a higher benefit. 4. Proactively & Automatically switch beneficiary to scheme with higher benefit as per eligibility. 5. Implementation of an online e-Payment System by undertaking end-to-end Integration with banking system for timely & hassle-free e-Payments.

The initiative helps the State to ensure and secure social security and assistance to all its citizens specially the old-age, poor and disabled in case of vulnerability, poverty, old age, sickness and disablement & in other cases of undeserved want. The initiative involved adoption of Proactive and Entitlement based Model of governance. It has allowed vulnerable & disadvantaged population to be sure of social security benefits and ensures benefits of social security services to poorest and most vulnerable in a hassle-free manner. Entitlement based model of governance has resulted in an institutional mechanism for setting high standards of services and results in making the public delivery systems proactive, inclusive, event-triggered, compassionate, efficient and corruption free. The system has relieved and insulated the underprivileged and disadvantaged sections of the society from the drudgery of approaching different offices of different departments and submitting individual and complicated application forms for each scheme along with copies of all supporting documents for seeking the benefit of social security.

The State is running several social security schemes like pensions, ex-gratia on death or disability, life insurance, financial assistance for marriages, corrective surgery for PwDs, Aids & implements for PwDs for citizens belonging to vulnerable, disadvantaged & underprivileged sections. Services involving sanction of benefits required interface with more than one office, involved repetitive verification of documents and was too complex from the perspective of the target vulnerable population. Conventional Demand-based model of governance was not able to deliver intended benefits / services as per entitlements in a transparent & hassle-free manner. Initiative has transformed system & resulted in manifold improvement in efficiency and effectiveness of system for welfare of residents of State by implementation of an enabling environment, simplification, rationalization, streamlining, re-engineering & transformation of back-end & other processes for extending benefits/services to citizens in a seamless manner. It also allowed universalization of social security by proactive identification of potential beneficiaries, automated & rule based sanction of benefits. It can be understood by following case: As a death a reported in State Population register, system proactively triggers for sanction of following social security benefits • Widow pension • Insurance claim • National Family Benefit Scheme • Funeral Assistance • Ex-Gratia

Before the initiative, implementation of social security schemes for Widows, Deserted, elderly, people with disability and other vulnerable & disadvantaged sections of population was being carried out by ~22,000 Village Panchayats & ~3000 Rural & Urban Local Bodies & other offices in manual & isolated manner. Manual, isolated & offline system of implementation of schemes suffered from several procedural gaps resulting in delay in sanction of benefits to eligible, delays in monthly payment of pension amount, non-payment of amount, person not getting the benefit of best schemes as per his /her eligibility, miscalculations etc. Overall, the system was extremely slow, error-prone, discretion-based & ineffective and was not able to deliver intended services in an effective, rule-based & transparent manner. The innovative initiative involved adoption of Proactive Model of Governance and implementation of all social security schemes using a common integrated database and application platform has not only accelerated but transformed public services by ensuring more effective, inclusive & accountable governance, as envisioned by SDG 16. Proactive & Entitlement based model of governance has also insulated target beneficiaries from drudgery of knowing schemes, their eligibility, rules, submission of application for service / benefit and repetitively submit supporting documents to establish eligibility.

State Government of Madhya Pradesh has launched the initiative with objective of simplified & effective implementation of various social security schemes being run by the State for underprivileged, vulnerable and disadvantaged sections of the society and offer door-step-delivery of services. State Population Register (SPR) is the core of the initiative. It has been created after extensive door-to-door survey of all households in entire State. Detailed Socio-economic and information that decide the eligibility and entitlement of any family & resident for social security and other schemes have been captured. Institutional mechanisms by been implemented so as to enforce regular updation of the population register and verification of the detailed profile of the individuals and families. Samagra Family ID has been issued to each of the 15 million families and Samagra Resident ID has been issued to 72 million residents of the State. The detailed socio-economic profile and families and residents allows the State to proactively identify and guarantee entitled social security benefits to target population (elderly & old age, Disabled, Widows, Destitute, Poor, Deserted women, mentally retarded persons, Persons with Disabilities) on the da-y s/he becomes eligible in a proactive & hassle-free manner. More than 50 million citizens are getting benefitted.

Predictive computing using Data-mash-up allows extraction of key information of beneficiary eg. age, sex, marital status , BPL status, disability status, bank account etc. from different online databases like State Population Register, Register of BPL families, Register of PwDs & generates list of individuals who are technically eligible for social security benefits but not getting benefit and who will become eligible after two months as they will attain required age. System automatically switches pensioner to better scheme with higher entitlement without involving any formal application, supporting documents, certificates & manual work. Previously switching to better scheme involved formal applications, supporting documents & several verifications and as a result most of pensioners were getting benefit of pension schemes with lesser amount. Integrated e-Payment System has been designed & implemented for ensuring timely DBT by undertaking End-to-end integration of Portal with core banking system of partner bank. The system generates a single e-Payment Order of ~12 Million INR for e-Payment of monthly pension amount to ~37 lakh beneficiaries. The ePO is digitally signed by authorized officer and is placed on the SFTP server of the partner bank. Partner bank processes e-Payment Order and shared the response bank on SFPT server.

• This is first such initiative in government domain that has successfully implemented a sustainable ICT based eco-system for ensuring a paradigm shift from Demand-driven & Reactive Model to Proactive, Inclusive & Entitlement-based model of governance. • This is first such initiative in government domain that has exploited data mash-up technologies to generate intelligence, predictive computing/forecasting so as to guarantee entitled social security benefits to target population (elderly & old age, Disabled, Widows, Destitute, Poor, Deserted women, mentally retarded persons, Persons with Disabilities) on the day s/he becomes eligible in a proactive & hassle-free manner. • Initiative has won "Gold Icon" National e-Governance Award of Government of India. • This Initiative is unique / innovative of its kind as it involves BPR, Convergence, process simplification, automation, DBT, Financial Inclusion and is benefiting the government & residents equally. • Unique & distinctive feature of initiative is ‘M-Pension Mitra’ Mobile App that facilitates mobile governance platform for effective implementation of social security schemes by extends all services & information to smart phone. It has allowed accessibility of online system / services to over 40 million population having access to smart phones.

In view of failure of large number of e-governance initiatives involving substantial investments, it was felt that Project should not entail initial expenditure on procurement of costly hardware, data centers, software licenses, software development, procurement of clients etc. It should also essentially use the existing infrastructure and manpower. In view of the above , the initiative has been designed, developed and implemented in-house by National Informatics Center, Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, Government of India. It has been hosted in Government Data Center and does not entail any major financial implication. Existing manpower resources were used for the project for long term sustenance.

Yes

• Article 41 of Constitution of India directs the State to provide assistance to its citizens in case of vulnerability, poverty, old age, sickness and disablement & in other cases of undeserved want. • Most of the welfare countries have such provisions in their constitutions. • The initiative has demonstrated a sustainable governance model for security the social security for the intended target population. • Government of India has identified initiative for replication in other States. • Other countries may also adopt the initiative for proactive and entitlement based implementation of the social security.

Since the launch of initiative, it was felt that it would not be possible to define complete requirements & scope of initiative in one go. Needs & requirements would continue to evolve, grow & mature. At the very beginning of initiative it was realized the only way the initiative could be sustained was by developing in-house competencies & engagement with stakeholders. For economy and sustainability, it was decided to to seek and engage with partners with no commercial interests. Therefore, an in-house professional agency without any commercial interest was needed to address the changing requirements, provide a continued handholding support and ensure its sustenance. Accordingly, the initiative was conceptualized & implemented in partnership with National Informatics Centre, Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology, Government of India and Central Bank of India The public is getting benefited from the system and it will be very difficult to discontinue the initiative. Initiative does not entail any major financial implication for its sustenance. The project reduce the workload of the offices in long run and also insulated the officers/staff from the political and other pressures and hence is acceptable to all. The initiative was designed and rolled out in such a manner that it was politically acceptable and the large number of stakeholders responsible for the success of the initiatives derived tangible benefits for their wilful support.

The project has been designed and developed in-house. In-house development facilitates easy adoption of the system to meet the ever growing and changing requirements that come-up at any moment of time. hence it is technically sustainable in long term. The Initiative use in-house resources, and did not involve any recurring expenditure on hardware, software, data center and licenses and hence is financially sustainable. The initiative does not involve any major financial involvement or require recurring expenditure. It essentially use the available manpower and other resources and is insulated from any financial issue/constraint.

Yes

The initiative has been evaluated by Department of Administrative reforms and Public Grievances, Government of India. During the evaluation, following aspects of the initiatives were evaluated: • Coverage: • Scope of Services / Activities Covered • Beneficiaries • No of services • Roll out/implementation model • technology Adopted • interoperability • Innovation • Citizen Centricity • Improvement in quality of services • Improvement in response time • Potential for Replication • Adaptability and Scalability • Sustainability • Efficiency Enhancement • Impact • Results Achieved / Value Delivered • Benefits to citizens • Benefits to Government • User convenience • Comparative Analysis of earlier V/S new system with respect to the BPR, Change Management, Outcome/benefit, change in legal system, rules and regulations

After three rounds of assessment and evaluation the project was selected for Award of prestigious "Gold Icon" National e-Governance Award of India for ‘INNOVATIVE USE OF TECHNOLOGY IN e-GOVERNANCE’ It is the apex e-Governance Award of India.

• Coverage : Entire State, 23,006 Village Panchayats, 313 Janpad Panchayats, 381 Urban Local Bodies • Scope of Services / Activities Covered - The project aims to transform the system by design, development and implementation of an enabling environment so as to simplify and rationalize and converge the schemes, streamline, re-engineer and automate back-end and other processes and provide benefits to beneficiaries though one common and integrated system, to bring about transparency through Direct Benefit transfer (DBT) without manual intervention after sanctioning, are the mandate of the Project. It also allowed proactive identification of the potential beneficiaries, automated and rule based sanction of benefits of the applicable scheme and electronic payment of the pension amount. • Beneficiaries - 50 million • No of services - 30 • Technology Adopted - Data-mash-up, Business Intelligence, predictive Computing, Digial Signature, public key infrastructure, Mobile Apps, GPS, SMS, Voice Call Alert, SFTP, SSL and other regular web and database technologies. • interoperability - using service oriented architecture and web-services • Innovation - involved a series of innovative techniques and applications. • Citizen Centricity - 100% • Improvement in quality of services - transformed the services • Improvement in response time - Zero, door-step-delivery of service. • Potential for Replication - Already in process • Adaptability and Scalability - yes • Sustainability - • Efficiency Enhancement - Significant. • Impact - tremendous • Results Achieved / Value Delivered • Benefits to citizens • Benefits to Government • User convenience • Comparative Analysis of earlier V/S new system with respect to the BPR, Change Management, Outcome/benefit, change in legal system, rules and regulations

The department did /does not have any DIRECT CONTROL on the offices i.e. RLBs and ULBs and GPs who are key stakeholders and responsible for the effective implementation of social security schemes. Over the last two decades, the workload of the ULBs/RLBs and GPs dealing with Social Security schemes has increased manifold without corresponding increase in the quantity and capability of the supervisory manpower. Limited manpower is overburdened with work related to implementation of numerous schemes that are related to developments. Social Security schemes were not considered as a priority sector and often took back seat. In view of failure of large number of e-governance initiatives involving substantial investments, it was felt that the initiative must be designed and rolled out in such a manner that it was politically acceptable and the large number of stakeholders responsible for the success of the initiatives derived tangible benefits for their wilful support. Stakeholders engagement was ensured to ensure its acceptance and support. Workshops, video-conferences were undertaken for ensuring capacity building, engagement and inclusion of all stakeholders.Online portal facilitates work-flow and facilitates coordination and collaboration. Partnership with a Central bank of India was also undertaken. End end-to-end integration with Central bank of India has been completed to facilitate e-Payments. Access to banking facilities is required for DBT. Several villages did not have a bank branch and the beneficiary were required to travel long distances for collecting the amount. Several rounds of meetings were undertaken with banks for making them agree to open branches in shadows areas. option of banking correspondent was also exercised for facilitating payments in extreme remote areas. large number of bank accounts were opened with the help of partner banks to enforce DBT and ePayments.

1. Conventional demand-driven, reactive, manual, paper-based & decentralized system is not appropriate for holistic implementation of Social Security Schemes in any welfare State. Several eligible & deserving persons are not able to get the social security benefits as they lack capacity & courage of approaching the government machinery for sanction of benefit. 2. ICT can be leveraged to transform and accelerate governance systems. Innovative techniques & technologies like Data mash-up, Business Intelligence & predictive computing can be used to generate intelligence, forecasting so as to guarantee entitled social security benefits to target population (old age, Disabled, Widows, Destitute, Poor, Deserted women, mentally retarded persons, Persons with Disabilities) on the day s/he becomes eligible in a proactive & hassle-free manner. 3. "Proactive & Entitlement-based model of Governance" is more suited for securing social security in a welfare State as it ensures timely & hassle-free sanction of social security schemes to beneficiaries as per eligibility & timely disbursal of benefit using DBT. 4. In-house design and development of initiatives without any commercial interest allows adoption of changing requirements and provide a continued handholding support for ensuring sustenance. 5. BPR, Convergence, process simplification, automation, DBT, Financial Inclusion benefits government & residents equally.