India on Monday began a special training programme for Maldivian and Bangladeshi civil servants at Mussoorie in Uttarakhand. K V Eapen, Secretary at Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) and V Srinivas, Additional Secretary at DARPG addressed 33 Maldivian and 31 Bangladeshi civil servants in a joint session on 'Public Policy and Governance' at the National Centre for Good Governance (NCGG) in Mussoorie. The special training programme for the civil servants of the two countries is being conducted by the National Centre for Good Governance (NCGG) under the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation programme (ITEC) from September 16 to 28 at Mussoorie and Delhi.

Digital revolution

Eapen said India's governance model is witnessing a digital revolution and development has become a people's movement to bring together innovation, technology, enterprise for efficient management of resources and successful implementation of priority programmes. The emphasis has been to provide clean and fair public administration, and the universal implementation of Aadhaar has enabled in reducing the digital divide, he said.

"India has witnessed an expansion in internet access with high speed internet connectivity in many parts of the country that has enabled promotion of technology enabled interventions in healthcare, education, energy, next generation financial services and e-governance. There was similarity in the district administrative set-ups in South Asia, with Bangladesh and the Maldives having similar civil service career paths," Eapen said.

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He added that the special training programme offers a unique opportunity for the exchange of information amongst nation states of South Asia. As the lead speaker, Srinivas said there has been a significant scaling up in the implementation of priority sector programmes, and the digital transformation in India's governance is visible.

"India's progress is best seen through 120 crore Aadhaar cards, rising numbers of e-transactions since the launch of Digital India, common service centres, Jan Dhan accounts, 85 per cent coverage in construction of toilets and above all the second largest digital consumer base with the benefits of technology being accepted by rural societies. The New India 2022 has focused on priority sector schemes of Swachh Bharat, Skill India, Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana, Startup India and Make in India schemes" Srinivas said.

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"Digitally empowered society"

He said that technological progress is visible in all welfare state programmes with direct benefits transfer schemes and digital payments using UPI and BHIM applications. "India has witnessed a significant number of success stories in the campaign to transform India to a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy," he said. Srinivas said India adopted a zero tolerance approach to corruption, with strong institutional and legislative frameworks to fight corruption, preventive vigilance practices, and stronger auditing and accounting practices. The civil servants sought to understand India's policies for interoperability of systems, norms regarding sharing of data, use of telemedicine facilities, stakeholder participation in rural development programmes, use of robust data sets for decision making, politician-civil servant relationship and guidelines for grievance redressal.

Fatimah Amira, a member of the Civil Services Commission of Maldives, thanked the Indian authorities for the unique opportunity to understand the best practices of India's governance model. The NCGG, India's leading civil services training institution, has been training civil servants from a number of countries in South Asia and Africa. Over the next five years, it will conduct training for 1,800 civil servants of Bangladesh and 1,000 civil servants of the Maldives.

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