Southern States - Karnataka-Bangalore

E-governance to end corruption: Krishna

By Our Staff Reporter

BANGALORE June 15. The Chief Minister, S.M.Krishna, has said that the Government has decided to computerise all sub-registrars' offices in the State in order to eliminate corruption.

Mr. Krishna was inaugurating the first ever Krishi Marata Vahini website (maratavahini.kar.nic.in) of the Agricultural Marketing Department and the State Agricultural Marketing Board here today. He said that to begin with, the 11 sub-registrars' offices in Bangalore Urban and Rural districts would be computerised shortly.

Although the Government was spending over 80 per cent of its resources for rural development, a section of the people were carrying on a campaign that his Government was urban oriented. He could discern a conspiracy in such talk. The very purpose of it was to deprive rural people of the benefits of scientific and technological developments. But his Government's undaunted efforts in exploiting information technology for the benefit of rural people and had disillusioned his critics, he said.

The new website would be linked to the existing 744 Raita Mitra Kendras. The objective of these kendras was the welfare of farmers and development of agriculture. Besides, the Government had taken a number of welfare measures, including reducing interest on agricultural loans to seven per cent and a Rs. 400-crore programme for price stabilisation. All these and the launch of Bhoomi programme (for obtaining land records) should be looked at from a broader perspective.

The Minister for Agricultural Marketing, B.S.Patil Sasnur, in his welcome address, said that two "Raita Santes" (farmers' shandies) on the lines of those started in Andhra Pradesh would shortly be inaugurated in Hubli and Yelahanka. Ample opportunities for marketing vegetables would be provided in these shandies. It was planned to open 222 shandies throughout the State at an estimated cost of Rs. 25 crore. Twenty-nine shandies were functioning in several parts of the State, he added.

The State is said to be the first to launch such a website in the country to implement e-governance to provide reliable data on daily arrivals of agricultural commodities with minimum and maximum prices in all 142 APMCs in the State of which 70 are to be computerised. Information will be available everyday by 4 p.m. It will enable 24-hour automatic collection and dissemination of market information on over 100 commodities. Besides, information from other States on various commodities can be had at one site, agmarknet.nic.in. The Vahini website is linked to the Bhoomi programme. The site will also provide information on various schemes proposed by the Department of Agricultural Marketing and the State Agricultural Marketing Board.

The Secretary to the Government, Department of Cooperation, A.Rama Swamy, and the Director-General of the National Informatics Centre, Delhi, N.Vijayaditya, spoke.

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