Kedarnath IT project bags e-governance award

MUSSOORIE: Rudrapayag district has brought laurels to the state as its most talked about Shri Kedarnath Yatra IT Project, installed and commissioned with an objective to providing assistance to pilgrims visiting Kedarnath after the 2013 natural disaster, bagged the 20th National Conference on E-governance held at Vishakapatnam in Andhra Pradesh on January 9 and 10.

Tribune News Service

Mussoorie, January 10

Rudrapayag district has brought laurels to the state as its most talked about Shri Kedarnath Yatra IT Project, installed and commissioned with an objective to providing assistance to pilgrims visiting Kedarnath after the 2013 natural disaster, bagged the 20th National Conference on E-governance held at Vishakapatnam in Andhra Pradesh on January 9 and 10.

Project head Dr Raghav Langer, IAS, District Magistrate and Chairman, District Disaster Management Authority, Rudraprayag, received the award for the installation and commissioning of wireless local area network in the Kedar valley from the district headquarters to the Kedarnath temple. The project included video conferencing, electronic surveillance through IP cameras, Wi-Fi, internet facility, hotline communication and provision of hot spots at different points on the yatra route. The ceremony was attended by Union Cabinet Minister M Venkaiah Naidu and other dignitaries from the Union government and the state government of Tamil Nadu.

This year’s conference with the theme of ‘digital transformation towards transforming India’ was organised jointly by the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and the Union Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances.

The Kedarnath wireless local area network project was awarded in silver category for the innovative use of technology in e-governance developed for the strengthening of communication along yatra route for effective disaster management, mitigation and response, along with the delivery of various ICT enabled services to pilgrims and locals and network bandwidth support to private operators for their service delivery.

Langer said, “Among various post-disaster reconstruction works and efforts put in by the state government for restarting the Kedarnath yatra, this flagship IT initiative has also been one significant contributor in instilling confidence in people regarding the safety of the pilgrimage that has seen increasing number of pilgrims coming to the shrine every year helping in reviving the Char Dham yatra and economy of the region.” The project was accorded ISO 9001:2008 certification last year.