Partnership (PPP) has failed to provide the services it promised since last year.

President of the Dhubri District Village Level Entrepreneurs Sanstha, Surajit Roy informed that under this project, altogether 95 CSCs have been opened so far since last year where one can get services like e-governance, banking, non-banking, railway and air ticket booking, mobile charging, telephone billing etc.

However, without providing services to the centre, Arunoday Kendra as known widely has been pressurising the VLE to sign the loan documents , a VLE, Roy alleged. “How can we pay back the bank loan of Rs. 1,20,000 at a monthly installment of Rs. 4500/- when we can not even earn Rs. 2000 in a month?” Roy asks.

Secretary of the Sanstha, A.H.M. Fazlul Hoque also alleged that the materials supplied by the Srei - Sahaj were of poor quality. Internet connection provided has been slow and generator sets are of inferior quality which could not be used.

Moreover, CSCs in Dhubri district have not been supplied Operating System Disk though included in the list of materials supplied to CSCs. Further, the commission against the insurance policies and other services are so low that it does not even cover the expenditure, Hoque alleged.

When contacted, Dhubri District Manager of Srei - Sahaj Office, Tinku Biswas said that this is the teething period and all the CSCs have been facing the problem.

Biswas also informed that the Assam government in a gazette notification issued on the 4th of August, 2009 states: ‘In order to provide transparent, time-bound and affordable Government to Citizen (G2C) Services to the citizens through the Common Services Centres (CSCs) being set up in Assam under the National eGovernance Plan (NeGP), the Governor of Assam is pleased to notify the Rates of the User Charges, Maximum Service Delivery Time Lines, Documents required and Approving Authorities for District level delivery of various Government (G2C) Services to the citizens’.

Further, in the gazette notification, the Assam government clearly stated that the Information Technology Department, Government of Assam, inter-alia, is responsible for implementing the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP), Government of India. The NeGP consists of establishment of (i) Assam State Wide Area Network (ASWAN), (ii) Common Service Centres (CSCs), (iii) State Data Center (SDC) and (iv) E - District.

The main objective of NeGP is to take the administration to the door steps of the people in order to ensure that Government Services are efficient, transparent and reliable while at the same time ensuring that life for common citizens is made easier.

The obvious disadvantage of such a system is that it involves expenditure on transport, lodging etc. on the part of the citizen, in addition to loss of wages etc. The CSCs scheme envisaged by the Government of India and adopted by the State Government aims at establishing computer kiosks at the rate of one per cluster of six villages.

These kiosks are intended to be single window points for Business to Citizen (B2C) and Government to Citizen (G2C) services.

However, all the plans and programmes seem to be falling flat owing to non-implementation of clauses of the gazette notification resulting in frustration among the VLEs in Assam.