By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, August 28, 2020: Odisha government next month will launch ‘OdishaOne’- an integrated web portal to facilitate citizen’s access to various government services like land mutation, payment of electricity dues, admission in colleges or payment of holding tax as well as availing pension.

The online services will be made available to citizens sometime in mid-September, officials said adding that there would be no need for people to visit offices once OndisaOne is operational.

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has made it clear to all officials that no one will need to go to a government office unless mandated by law. As part of the chief minister’s 5T initiative, the OdishaOne portal would be a one-stop platform for citizens to access all government services.

All e-governance applications of various departments will be linked to the OdishaOne portal and once it is rolled out in the next three weeks, people can access it. It would be single unified resource portal for citizens officials said adding that the portal would be integrated with various secure payment gateways of banks as well as Paytm.

Of the 324 services notified under Odisha Right to Public Services Delivery Act, more than 220 services have been made online till date and others are being rolled out. By now, government to citizen services (G2C) – like issuance of birth certificate, death certificate, payment of holding tax, payment of trade license fees, payment of water bill, payment of electricity bills, booking of the tickets of OSRTC buses, among others – have been integrated with the portal.

In fact, the state has taken lead in the country by launching several e-governance initiatives such as Go Swift, a one-stop investor facilitation portal for ease of doing business in Odisha that automates major clearances, permits and approvals required for establishment and expansion of industries in Odisha.

The state launched the P-PAS (Paddy Procurement Automation System) process five years ago and has managed to digitize all paddy procurement and payment transactions bringing much-needed accountability and transparency. To secure such data of farmers from tampering, Odisha implemented blockchain technology in P-PAS, thereby making the procurement transaction records tamper-proof and assuring the farmer and millers of the correct price for their output.

Similarly, in the education sector, Odisha has kickstarted ‘Student Academic Management System (SAMS)’ for e-admission and post-admission academic administration at higher secondary and undergraduate degree levels across all the colleges in the state. Officials said SAMS has managed to provide citizen-centric, transparent, time-saving platform of admission and academic administration. The state has also developed an application called ‘E-blood Bank’ through which citizens can get the complete district-wise blood stocks on each blood group available with blood banks.

To increase the efficiency in revenue administration, the state has started e-registration and computerisation of all 316 sub-registrar offices across the state. The Integrated Finance Management System has helped in processing pension papers of government employees.

Meanwhile, the state government on Friday bowed to pressure from food right activists by announcing not to insist on Aadhaar verification for people availing monthly social security pension from August. The Aadhaar verification or Aadhaar seeding of the database of beneficiaries of social security schemes, such as National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP) and state’s Madhu Babu Pension Yojana (MBPY) done through online mode, had managed to seed around 82 percent NSAP and 75 percent MBPY beneficiaries.

The process left around 11 lakh beneficiaries in the lurch, drawing protests from food rights activists after which the state government withdrew its order making Aadhaar mandatory for withdrawal of pensions. However, Odisha has seen success when it comes to providing services through online mode.