The north eastern state of Nagaland created history by becoming the first State Assembly in the entire country to implement the National e-Vidhan Application (NeVA) programme to become completely paperless.In the ongoing Budget session of the state the Nagaland Assembly Secretariat has attached a tablet or e-book on each table in the 60 members' assembly.

Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Pralhad Joshi tweeted, "Nagaland becomes India's 1st Legislative Assembly to successfully implement National e-Vidhan project. Now members can use electronic devices to participate in House proceedings. This initiative encourages paperless operations and reflects government's commitment towards Ashta Lakshmi."

Nagaland becomes India's 1st Legislative Assembly to successfully implement National e-Vidhan project.

Now members can use electronic devices to participate in House proceedings. This initiative encourages paperless operations & reflects Govt's commitment towards Ashta Lakshmi. pic.twitter.com/bGdOALs2Ge

NeVA is a Unicode compliant software having provision for easy access to various documents like List of Questions, List of Business, Reports etc. bilingually viz. English and any regional language. This application is spearheading the principle of ‘One Nation- One Application’ with the objective of Cloud First and Mobile First to serve Members’ FIRST.

Technical & financial provisions have been made under NeVA for creating digital archives of entire legacy data and making it available to users including Members and citizens in easy to search mode through mobile App and website as well.

“National eVidhan Application (NeVA)", a Mission Mode Project for Digital Legislatures to make the functioning of all Legislative Houses in the country paperless has been developed on the theme of ‘One Nation – One Application’. NeVA is transforming all State Legislatures into ‘DIGITAL HOUSES’ so as to enable them to transact entire Government Business on digital platform including information exchange with the State Government Departments in digital mode. It stands for bringing far reaching transformation in the governance across the country by making the people well informed & enlighten citizens and thereby strengthening the roots of the democracy in the country. NeVA is not only bringing greater synergy, coordination, transparency and accountability between the Legislature and the executive in a State, but also across the States. Keeping in view the latest technological development in the field of ICT, maximum use of AI& IOT has been made to make NeVA a robust IT product.

Since, the process involving the functioning of all Legislatures are similar except some minor variations, enabling provisions have been incorporated in NeVA for onboarding it by the two Houses of Parliament also.

To adopt National e-Vidhan Application (NeVA), Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) have been signed with 18 States viz(1) Punjab (2)Odisha, (3) Bihar {both Houses}, (4) Meghalaya, (5) Mizoram, (6)Manipur, (7) Gujarat, (8) Arunachal Pradesh, (9) Nagaland, (10) Puducherry, (11) Tripura, (12)Himachal Pradesh, (13) Chhattisgarh, (14)Tamil Nadu, (15)Sikkim, (16)Haryana, (17) Uttar Pradesh{both Houses} (18) Jharkhand.

Out of these 18, Detailed Project Reports have been submitted by13 States viz.(1) Punjab (2) Odisha, (3) Bihar {both Houses}, (4) Nagaland, (5) Manipur, (6) Sikkim, (7) Tamil Nadu, (8) Meghalaya, (9)Haryana,(10)Tripura (11) Uttar Pradesh (both Houses)(12) Mizoram, (13) Arunachal Pradesh for sanction of funds. All but last one (Arunachal Pradesh) have been sanctioned necessary funds as per the requirement of respective Legislature for implementation of the Project. All these Legislatures have also begun the procurement of various devices as per their requirement following the respective procurement procedure & General Financial Rules/ Regulations/ guidelines without any interference by the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.

As a special achievement, Bihar Legislative Council became the first House in the country to transit to NeVA platform completely on 25th Nov, 2021 and conducted Winter Session, 2021on the NeVA platform in paperless mode. They will also be conducting the ensuing Budget Session, 2022 on the NeVAplatform. Odisha Assembly also presented their budget 2021 in paperless mode using NeVA. Other Houses are also adopting the same path and during next few months with the completion of procurement of IT devices and installation of necessary infrastructure in and around the Houses, noticeable changes would be visible in the functioning of all State Legislatures.

Keeping in view the federal structure and autonomy of the State/UT Legislatures, all are being encouraged to adopt NeVA.

Never miss a story! Stay connected and informed with Mint. Download our App Now!!

Log in to our website to save your bookmarks. It'll just take a moment.

Oops! Looks like you have exceeded the limit to bookmark the image. Remove some to bookmark this image.

Your session has expired, please login again.

You are now subscribed to our newsletters. In case you can’t find any email from our side, please check the spam folder.

This is a subscriber only feature Subscribe Now to get daily updates on WhatsApp