Nagarik App – Preparing Nepal for Digital Nepal

The first episode of the Digital Samvad 2.0 program was held on Saturday dated 2078/01/25 on the topic of “Nagarik App – Preparing Nepal for Digital Nepal”. The dialogue was conducted in the presence of Former Minister Mr. Ganesh Shah along with key resource persons, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, Mr. Anil Kumar Dutt; Chief of Chakraghatta Municipality, Sarlahi, Mr. Bikram Yadav, CAN Federation President Mr. Nawaraj Kunwar, and Youth Representative Celsya Chhetri.

The first episode of Digital Samvad 2.0 was conducted using the ZOOM application.  Apart from the keynote speakers, there were representatives of various ministries, authorities, and departments under the Government of Nepal. Similarly, the Managing Director of Nepal Telecom, former chairpersons of CAN Federation, representatives of state and local governments, and representatives of district administration offices also had direct participation in the program.

The dialogue was also broadcasted live through 4 different Facebook pages including Living with ICT. The program has been watched by more than 10,000 people so far. There were more than 150 direct participants in ZOOM.

Program Coordinator and former Minister Mr. Ganesh Shah said, the Nagarik app is an important platform of Digital Nepal for the government services and facilities of Nepal and stressed the need to work together for its implementation. He suggested that the public should be made aware of this app so that the citizens can directly benefit from it and move towards making it more effective in the coming days.

Asgar Ali, IT Advisor to the Prime Minister, the key resource person of the program, informed that 80 more new services will be added to the Nagarik app which was unveiled as a full version on ICT Day 2021 within six months. The concept note was introduced 3 years ago. According to him, most of the government payments will be made from this app within six months and services will be added to the citizen app in three different phases.

Ali said that more than 13 million people could avail of the services if the government services were provided in technology. He said that the citizen app was developed under the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology as per the directive of good governance and the app’s hosting and technical support is being provided by the team of the National Information Technology Center.

Speaking on the occasion, he expressed his commitment to do the work at the state and local level from the citizen app and said that a big transformation can be made in government service delivery through this app. He said that the data of the app will be kept safe as security has been checked by three different agencies.

Informing that the guideline of Nagarik app that does not cost money to operate is being passed, Joint Secretary Anil Dutt said that digital Nepal framework will be promoted, the internet will be provided to rural and government offices as well as schools, 5G will be tested and SIM card will be distributed free of cost. He said that the government is doing such things. He also said that the ministry is ready to provide 24 hours service by preparing more than 40 manpower as soon as the directive is passed.

Speaking on the dialogue, Dutta said that more than 200,000 downloaded by 625,000 people have been verified so far. He said that some works have been delayed due to the need to get approval from various agencies for the work. He also informed that 9 services have come in the app and the work has been taken forward by adding more services on the 19th of Baisakh.

“The government has tried many things through the one-window system. This is an effort,” said Nawaraj Kunwar. He suggested that the government of Nepal should extend the infrastructure to every rural body in the country and provide services not only to those who now have access to the internet and smartphones but also to those who do not have access. Kunwar expressed his commitment to developing technology-friendly manpower by advancing digital literacy and for which CAN Federation would work together.

Speaking on the occasion, Celsya Chhetri said that there were problems with long queues and other documents while availing government services, but it is good that the app was trying to solve it. She warned the government that if we do not move forward with digitalization efforts, we may fall behind.

She said that there are many parts of the improvement, adding that other services should be added to the app and its use should be increased by raising awareness. She also stressed the need to create strategic teams and address them from the grassroots.

According to Asgar Ali, IT advisor to the Prime Minister, most of the government payments will be made through this app within six months. Giving a presentation at the program, he informed that the system of paying transport tax under Bagmati Pradesh will be started soon. Ali also said that all the facilities from drinking water, financial, annual tax payments, and other government services will be provided through this app. Similarly, for the convenience of the students, Tribhuvan University and Kathmandu University will also be connected to the app soon and arrangements have been made to open a bank account from the Nagarik app itself.

This report, prepared from the first episode of Digital Samvad 2.0 on “Nagarik App – Preparing Nepal for Digital Nepal”, covers all aspects of the program, including pre-program documents, highlights, and post-program highlights. The concept of the program, the outline of the program, the invitation sent to attend the program are presented in the first section of the report. The second section of the report contains a summary of the program, slides of presentations, banners and glimpses of the main program, some glimpses of live broadcast pages, questions and suggestions from the participants as well as the main highlights of the program.

The third section contains links and glimpses of the coverage of various online media and journals covering the first episode of the Digital Dialogue 2.0 program, while the fourth section of the report notes the main points from the discussion and the article. Relevant sources of research and ideas taken from various mediums for conducting this program are noted in the fifth section of this report. Readers are invited to learn about the entire program from this report, which is divided into five sections.