West Bengal has taken some good steps for effective implementation of the rural development schemes. The State has implemented several e-Governance initiatives that have helped improve government-citizen interface. West Bengal is in Emerging category in this year’s SKOCH Governance study. The State won 3 SKOCH Orders-of-Merit and 1 SKOCH Governance award in Gold category.

Key Achievements

Panchayats & Rural Development Department has a project for Institutional Strengthening of Gram Panchayat (ISGP). The Department has put in place Geographical Information System (GIS) based system of monitoring for rural development works. The web-based monitoring system seeks to completely replace the manual system of data accumulation and preparation of analytical reports required at various levels of PRI administration.

The Department has also introduced an initiative of strengthening local governance through Annual Performance Assessment (APA) linked grant transfer model. Performance Based Grant Transfer System has been put in place to encourage healthy competition among the Gram Panchayats (GPs). The APA has been done by an independent and third party/agency to ensure impartiality and to rule out any degree of collusion or conflict of interest in the selection of the qualifying GPs and the grants provided to the GPs in timely and predictable manner.

Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has implemented a number of e-Governance projects with the objective to make the city safer and better for living. The Corporation has implemented Business Process Re-engineering that has helped simplify major municipal functions. Automation has helped reduce costs of various functions and made the system more transparent and efficient.