Union Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology (IT) Sachin Pilot inaugurated the Puducherry State Database Centre (PYSDC) here on Saturday. It will host and manage e-governance applications of the territorial government and its constituent departments.
Set up at an estimated cost of Rs. 27 crore, the centre has been identified as one of the core infrastructure facilities for supporting e-governance initiatives of the National e-Governance Plan.
The PYSDC has been interfaced with the Puducherry State Wide Area Network through dedicated fibre interface with 8 Mbps bandwidth that would provide access to e-governance applications and services through the Intranet for government employees and through the Internet for the public.
Puducherry Minister for Public Works M.O.H.F Shahjahan, who also holds IT portfolio, said that the territorial government would set up an “IT-SEZ” on a proposed area of 27.61 acres. The SEZ would attract a projected income of Rs. 525.53 million and generate 45,000 direct and indirect jobs over a period of five years.
Earlier, Mr. Pilot launched the Linux DVD of Bharat Operating Systems Solutions (BOSS), its support centre and a lab at the Pondicherry Engineering College.
Union Minister of State V. Narayanasamy, Lieutenant Governor Iqbal Singh and Chief Minister V. Vaithilingam spoke.
Mr. Singh also launched the Information and Communications Technology Academy of Puducherry during the event.
Later in the day, Mr. Pilot inaugurated post offices at Thirukannur and Villianur taken up for modernisation under the centrally sponsored Project Arrow programme.
All the post offices would be equipped with broadband connectivity to provide web-based services of the department such as eMoney order, Western Union Money Transfer, Instant Money order and e-post, he said, adding that the government would spend Rs.1,800 crore for computerisation and modernisation of all 1.55 lakh post offices in the country.
Talking about Puducherry BSNL circle, he said it had been adding mobile subscribers at a rapid rate.
In the last one year, BSNL added nearly 42,000 subscribers.
