Central government office space of the size of around 320 football fields has been cleared of clutter and junk in the past two years as part of two special drives, data shows. Now, the Centre has decided to scale-up efforts to reach a “saturation level” in all offices as part of its upcoming ‘Special Campaign 3.0’.
According to data available with the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG), around 90% of the files across Central government Ministries and attached offices are being generated in the electronic mode.
The weeding out of physical files, reducing pendency of public grievances, beautifying office space, and moving to the digital mode are part of the ‘Special Campaign’ Secretariat reforms being undertaken by the government. So far, two campaigns have been completed, and the third drive take place from October 2-31.
“The Special Campaign 3.0, inspired by the ideals of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, seeks to institutionalise swachhata [cleanliness] and minimise pendency in government with a saturation approach. The previous two campaigns, and adopting the practices on a continuous basis, have enabled significant transformation of government offices with timely redressal of public grievances, digitisation of office spaces, and archiving of office records,“ V. Srinivas, Secretary, DARPG, said.
A portal has been created to monitor the campaign.
From October 2021 to July 2023, a total of 184.66 lakh square feet or 423 acres of space was freed up in Central government offices across the country. Old computers, printers, desks, tables, cupboards, and vehicles, among other items, were pulled out and sold as scrap in the open market. The government earned ₹595.57 crore from the process. A senior government official said that the Indian Army sold used trucks in the open market, earning ₹212 crore in the process.
Paper files were either shredded or sent to the National Archives of India (NAI). “There were a few important files, dating back to the British era, which were discovered during the cleanliness drive. One of the files pertained to the Partition. The file was handed over to the NAI and they have preserved the record,” the official said.
Data shows that there has been a massive increase in the number of e-files generated in the past three years. In 2020, the total number of e-files generated across Ministries stood at 14.27 lakh, which increased to 31.90 lakhs e-files till June 30, 2023.
The government implemented the e-office system to bring in efficiency and transparency in expediting the transformation towards a ‘digital Secretariat’, the official said. Out of the 84 Ministries and departments, the e-office has been adopted fully in 75 Ministries.
Some Ministries, including Home, Environment, Information and Broadcasting, and Civil Aviation are still using paper files, and are yet to fully migrate to the digital mode.
The official said that the e-office does not cater to the requirements of “secret, top secret, classified communications” — such files are only handled in the physical mode.
“During audit, a huge pendency was found in the replies that are to be sent to queries raised by Members of Parliament. All Ministries were asked to expedite the replies and also pay special attention to public grievances received on the Central government’s portal (CPGRAMS),” the official said.
The number of Members of Parliament references that were settled rose from 8,765 in October 2021 to 19,973 in July 2023. In all, 37,781 MP references have been closed so far. Similarly, the number of public grievances that were settled in the past two years stood at 40,31,289.
