ePDS wins prestigious Skoch Order of Merit Award

ePDS wins prestigious Skoch Order of Merit Award

            Vijyender Sharma

SHIMLA---Transparency Portal of ePDS project developed by Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department, Government of HP has won the prestigious "Skoch Order of Merit Award" on 22ed September 2015 by the Skoch Group in a function organized at New Delhi.
            Shri Priyatu Mandal, Director, Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department received this award. He congratulated the team for dedicated efforts made in Transparency Portal, which resulted a national level recognition of the project.
             Transparency Portal under ePDS project of Himachal State is having unique features and made its differential position across country. Jury members chose Transparency Portal of Himachal Pradesh as India's top 100 Smart eGovernance Project among the 1000 proposal received from different parts of the country. A presentation was made in front of Jury members where top 300 projects were selected. Based on the presentation and queries Transparency Portal of ePDS Project was selected as top 100 Smart eGovernance Project in country.
            Shri Mandal informed that automation of PDS was the foremost priority of the Department and it made vigorous efforts towards end-to-end computerization of PDS across the State. ePDS would cover various aspects of PDS operations such as creation and management of digitized beneficiary database, supply chain management of PDS commodities till FPS, transparency and grievance redressal mechanism using call centres/toll-free helpline numbers (1967), SMS based monitoring and Web-sites/ citizens' portal and Fair Price Shop (FPS) automation.
            The department has made a portalwww.epds.co.in as a single grievance portal for availability of information related to ePDS project. Unique features like Price Monitoring, Ration Card Information, Calculation of Eligible Quantity of Ration, Live Chat with Call Centre Agent, Aadhaar Status Updates, Information of Geo-tagged location of FCS&CA Department offices, Stock Availability, Freight Rate have made this portal differentiated from other state's Portal and awarded as Order of Merit Award 2015.
            The Director also informed that Department was going to automate FPS in state and pilot from Shimla will start from November 2015. A Mobile App was also being developed for ease of access of information to the beneficiary as well as transaction features through Mobile App.