Data based decision-making key to good governance

NEW DELHI: The government and its various departments have been using data mining and analysis to arrive at intelligent and informed decisions. It is very important to make use of data for decision making, which impacts the citizens of the country.

"Requirement of data driven decision making is a prerequisite for good governance. India has been talking of the digital divide between rural and urban areas but this divide exists within the offices and institutions of the government too", said Lt. Gen. Davinder Kumar, signal officer in chief, Army Headquarters, while speaking at the inaugural session of a seminar on Data Drive Decision Making - The Power to Know, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here today.

While citing several examples where data driven decision-making has led to good governance in the Indian system, Lt. Gen Kumar said: "we need to integrate the islands of excellence to give decisions which the citizens deserve."

On a similar note, M. R. Ramakrishnan, managing director, Center for Railway Information Systems, said "business requirements are changing and today we need to transfer data into knowledge. We are not looking at transactions but at processing. It is important to use data available for decision making in an effective manner".

Prakash Kumar, Secretary - IT, Government of Delhi explained the various initiatives of the Revenue Department of the state in curbing evasion of tax. On the use of data for decision making he said, "earlier inspectorate staff from the enforcement teams would go into inspection and scrutiny of tax payers without using any methodology." Today data is analysed and statistical equations and formulae are used to identify the person who should be scrutinised."

An exercise to integrate databases of various departments has recently been launched to create one view for the state government, less paper work and less requirement of attested copies of proofs, etc. Data warehousing and business intelligence project is being worked out towards this end.

While detailing the challenges faced by various government departments in the implementation of a data based decision making process, B. B. Nanawati, Commissioner, Income Tax, Systems said, "such a system threatens established treaty lines and turfs and a fear of audit and exposure gets instilled in the organisation. Data politics exists in all departments and there is a perceived loss of power with such a system being implemented".

For such a system to be successful it is important to establish clear bilateral treaty in the department and see that people are able to have both functional and non-functional treaty lines.

Challenging the government officials and participants of the seminar to walk

the walk and talk the talk, Phillip Carter, Head- Government, SAS Asia Pacific said, "Government organizations in India must move towards innovation and change the way they operate. They must develop an intelligent strategy for this purpose."