Centre notifies email policy for Ministries, Central departments

The policy is in supersession of 2015 guidelines on the Union government’s email system

Updated - October 30, 2024 09:56 pm IST - NEW DELHI

Image used for representative purpose only.

Image used for representative purpose only. | Photo Credit: REUTERS

The Union government on Wednesday (October 30, 2024) notified the Email Policy of Government of India, 2024, outlining which government departments and bodies must use the National Informatics Centre (NIC)’s NICeMail service. The policy requires that email addresses be specific to government employees’ individual service. For instance, an IPS officer would have an email address ending with @ips.gov.in, as opposed to simply @gov.in. The policy replaces previous 2015 rules on government email addresses.

The policy provides for generic job-derived email addresses for officers who hold certain positions, as well as a generic name-based email address that would stay with them throughout their service in government. It also provides for redirecting of emails to transferred officials, and archiving of designation-based inboxes after an officer completes their tenure at a certain role.

The NICeMail service is used by much of the Union bureaucracy and by States. While the NIC, under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, hosts and maintains the email service, many email inboxes across the government have been shifted in recent months to Zoho. Reports indicated that up to 50 lakh email inboxes across the government may be handled by the Chennai-based IT firm.

The policy also allows NIC’s email services to be leased by private players in exchange for a fee. For government organisations, NICeMail will remain free of charge. The policy also moves to clearly distinguish private contractors and consultants who work with the government on a non-permanent basis —  external contractors as well as consultants will need to have “-contractor” appended to the domain names on their email addresses. For instance, a consultant in the IT Ministry would have an email address that reads “name@meity-external.gov.in”. 

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