Digital Governance: An Intersection of Ideas for Public Policy

Technology is a crucial enabler of economic growth, and digital governance is a means to ensure inclusive economic development in any country. Technology played a pivotal role in tackling the menace caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has been described as a once-in-a-century event and brought unprecedented chaos and disruption in its trial. The systemic shock was experienced not only in the health services domain, but the subsequent mobility restrictions and nationwide lockdowns caused havoc in the lives of the citizens as the delivery of even common governance services was disturbed. The unknown nature of the virus and the misinformation around its emergence and spread only added to the mayhem. This chapter talks about how digital governance helped the Government of India in not only managing this pandemonium caused by COVID-19 but also ensuring the continuity of delivery of government services using a variety of digital applications. It discusses how the ‘Digital India Mission’ laid the groundwork for this exercise wherein the focus of the government was on creating digital infrastructure, such as Unified Payment Interface (UPI), Diksha, Ayushman Bharat, etc., across sectors and building standardised digital solutions using the India Enterprise Architecture (IndEA) framework. These initial head starts played a pivotal role in the management of COVID-19 as the Government of India used its existing applications and developed a few specialised ones for preventive communication, disease management, and delivery of governance services. Specifically, we address how the emergence, use, and continuous improvement of applications, such as the MyGov platform, Aarogya Setu, CoWin, UMANG, and DigiLocker, helped in the timely dispensation of authentic information coupled with citizen-centric services, thereby providing relief to citizens as well as allowing the government in better management of its resources. The chapter concludes with the key impediments that limit the effectiveness and acceptance of these digital solutions in today's day and time.