News

Bangalore utility board to head up e-governance project

November 5, 2003

BANGALORE, India -- The Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), which is making a foray in the area of e-payment in a big way, has been entrusted with initiating the prestigious Bangalore One project for e-governance.

According to an article in The Times of India, the project calls for setting up an e-governance

portal for multi-utility services. But it has been gathering dust for the last two years. It is born out of an agreement signed between the Karnataka government and Microsoft during its chief Bill Gates' recent visit to Bangalore. Microsoft is no longer a part of the project.

The government has chosen BWSSB to spearhead the project since it is the first among the very few civic agencies to have been modernized. Most of its operations are conducted at the click of a button or a mouse. The board's administration is computerized.

The board offers 24-hour bill-payment kiosks, automated sewage treatment plants with telemetry, LAN-WAN access, spot-billing with handheld computers, automated grievance redressal system and geographic information systems, the article said.

The article did not mention a new timeframe for the Bangalore One project.