This was disclosed by Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi MoS in the Ministry of Urban Development while inaugurating the workshop on e-Gazette organized by the Directorate of Printing of Ministry of Urban Development in New Delhi today.
Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi said that the dedicated cell created in the Directorate of Printing has uploaded all these pages of Gazette Notifications from the year 1922 onwards.
These uploaded pages can be accessed anywhere and can be downloaded free of cost. Speaking about the history of printing to its present day form e-Gazette, the Minister of State said that Kolkata has played a significant role in this area.
It was in the city of Kolkata that the first Government of India Press was set up in 1862. Today, the Directorate of Printing has 17 Government of India Presses, Text Books Presses, and Units under its administrative control throughout the country. Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi said that digitalization of various documents like Birth Certificates, Licenses, Aadhaar cards etc is the crux of e-Governance and ensures speed, accountability and transparency in the system.
E-Gazette is one such very insignificant step in this direction. It plays a major role in providing information to the citizens about major policy decisions and policy announcements of the Govt. of India. The Minister added that while manual operations have a finite nature, technology provides infinite opportunity of operations, access, and organizing information in a systematic manner.
It was towards this end that the e-Gazette was inaugurated and launched in 2008. Weekly Gazette of India Notifications and important rules, regulations, orders, bye-laws notifications are now available on e-Gazette.
Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi highlighted the need to popularize the e-Gazette facility and to generate awareness among the people so that they can have easy access to policy decisions and also announcements of the Govt. of India. She also expressed hope that the States will take up e-Gazette on a war footing and adopt it along the lines of Govt. of India. She expressed hope that the States participating in the workshop will be able to take back important information and lessons from the workshop.
Speaking on the occasion Dr. Ashok Singhvi, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Urban Development said that e-Gazette has added speed as well as ease to the process of accessing Govt. related information. It has introduced transparency in administration and is citizens friendly. It is significant to note that the Gazette Notifications are released on e-Gazette as soon as they are printed. The site is uploaded regularly to make it user friendly.
Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi also released a magazine “Mudran” of the Directorate of Printing on the occassion.
