For the last few years, the Government of Assam has been confering the prestigious Anundoram Borooah Award with citation in the form of a Certificate alongwith a personal computer(PC) to honour the meritorious students securing First Division in the HSLC, High Madrassa and FM Examinations conducted by SEBA and State Madrassa Education Board, Assam.

The “Anundoram Borooah Award Scheme was announced by Sri Tarun Gogoi, Hon'ble Chief Minister of Assam on the floor of the Assembly in the Budget Session during March, 2005 as a unique award scheme to encourage competitive spirit among the students in the State. The education landscape has quite changed after this announcement by the Hon'ble Chief Minister. First there was disbelief which soon changed into awe and then into a unique emotional bonding of the parents, students, awardees and teachers for this scheme.

The Anundoram Borooah Award Scheme was launched by the Govt. of Assam in the year 2005 with the sole aim of enhancing healthy competition amongst the student community and to help them to enrich their perception through up-to-date knowledge and information with the help of IT education. In this age of globalization, Information Technology already has significantly altered many aspects of life and in recent years this robust field has made its place into the academic curriculum of schools and colleges up to the university level. Therefore, looking at the present scenario of the innate potentialities of the IT industry, the Government of Assam has made an effort to promote IT education through this unique scheme.

The award was instituted in the honour of Late Anundoram Borooah who was the 4th Indian (and the 1st Assamese) to join the prestigious ICS and the 1st Indian to be appointed as Deputy Commissioner. He was also a great Sanskrit scholar and authored several books including the Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Please click here for a brief snippet on his life and times, the way it appears on the certificate issued to the awardee students.

The Assam Electronics Development Corporation Ltd was entrusted to carry out the scheme on behalf of the Planning & Development Department. The 1st programme of Anundoram Borooah Award was launched centrally at the historic Judges Field on 14th September, 2005 by Sri Tarun Gogoi, Hon’ble Chief Minister of Assam. District level programmes were held in every district and were attended by the Hon'ble Ministers and MLAs. Thousands of enthusiastic students, guardians and teachers attended each of these programmes.

In the second year in 2006, the programme of computer distribution was ceremoniously launched by the Hon’ble Chief Minister at the Judges Field on 17th December, 2006. Like previous year, district and sub division level programmes were held for distribution. Like previous year, the programmes were enthusiastically attended by thousands of students, guardians and principals. In the third year in 2007, the computer distribution programme was launched on 2nd February, 2008 by the Hon’ble Chief Minister at the Judges Field. Like last two years, similar programmes were held in district and sub division level. Responses of teachers, students, guardians in these programmes were very much encouraging. Similarly, for the fourth conjugative year in 2008, the computer distribution programme was launched on 22nd January, 2009 by the Hon’ble Chief Minister at Veterinary Field, Khanapara, Guwahati. The distribution programmes were successfully completed though out the State of Assam. As decided by the Govt. all the student securing 1st Division in the final examination (FM) conducted by the State Madrassa Board were also included under the scheme.

For the fifth year, the Anundoram Borooah awards were given away ceremonially to the successful students for 2009 by the Hon'ble Chief Minister, Assam on the 18th December, 2009 at the Veterinary Field, Khanapara, Guwahati. The award is being distributed in other districts now...

The quantum of the awards distributed for the last five years are shown as below (including Madrassa board*):-

Year	No of 1st Div.	No. of PCs distributed	No. of Cheques Distributed	Total nos. of Awardees
2005	12,756	12,649	107	12756
2006	13,493	12,358	1135	13493
2007	12,692	11,094	1614	12708
2008	17,331	14,722	2558	17331
2009	17362	under progress

Links of photographs of the programme and the distribution ceremony can be accessed from the ARBAS Menu on top left. The configuration of the computer system distributed each year can be seen here.

AMTRON is conducting various Employment Generation Schemes with the help of the Government and the Private Sector companies to provide training and employment to the youth of Assam. These are:

• EMPL Mission: IT Cum Bahavioural Training For Enhancement of Employability Skills of Educated Unemployed Youths of Assam under the Employment Generation Mission, Govt. of Assam
• Mukhya Mantrir Tathya Prajukti Prashikshan Aru Niyog Achoni (MMTPPANA)
• NASSCOM Certification & Benchmarking Programme in IT Skills for the Graduates/Undergraduates as well as PG Students

AMTRON signs MoU to setup IT Park at Guwahati

An agreement has been sigend on 16th September 2009, between Assam Electronics Development Corporation Ltd. (AMTRON) and M/S Srei Infrastructure Finance Ltd., Kolkata. M/S Srei Infrastructure Finance Ltd., being the prime bidder of the Consortium, the other members of the Consortium are M/S North Eastern Development Finance Corporation (NEDFi), Guwahati and M/S Holistic Urban Innovation Ltd., Noida.

Overview of SWAN

The National e-Governance Plan (NEGP) of Government of India has a clear focus on improving delivery of government services to citizens. Towards this end, it has identified several Mission Mode Projects (MMP) both at the Central and State levels, aimed at readying various central and state government departments and organizations for electronic delivery of services including several other e-governance initiatives also being undertaken by the State governments and the Central Ministries. NEGP recognizes that creation of independent infrastructure required to ensure service delivery by each department is neither cost-effective for government nor convenient for the citizen. Considering the need for creating reliable access network throughout the country, State Wide Area Network (SWAN) has been identified as one of the MMPs under the NEGP. Department of Information Technology (DIT), Government of India is the nodal department for this Mission Mode Project ad Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved the SWAN Scheme for implementation in 29 States and 6 Union Territories. The SWAN Scheme proposes to establish a minimum 2 Mbps connectivity upto the block level through extension and creation of State Wide Area Networks (SWANs) across the country. The Internet, which is a loosely organized international collaboration of autonomous, interconnected networks, supports host-to-host communication through voluntary adherence to open protocols and procedures and procedures defined by Internet Standards. There are also many isolated interconnected networks, which are not connected to the global Internet but use the Internet Standards. The State Wide Area Network(SWAN), which will be specifically and independently built for a particular State with heterogeneous applications and Devices in the network should have common Network Standards & Security Policy to be followed by each of the independent SWAN Network. The SWANs should be interoperable and the biggest advantage is that, it allows for partial or three-layer solutions, where the Networks overlap in some but not all places, or where an intermediate layer that speaks to both protocols is created.

ESSENTIAL FEATURES OF THE SWAN STRUCTURE

• Inter-operability with NICNET at State Hqrs. and adherence to other Standards, Interconnect and Security policy Guidelines already circulated to the States.
• Wireless connectivity infrastructure required at Block Hqrs for connectivity to ‘Common Service Centers’ (CSCs).
• Network connectivity hardware at State Hqrs. PoP required to support connectivity and traffic load for the State Data Centre (SDC)
• Voice over IP phones to be made available at least one at each PoP
• Network items to support both IPv4 and IPv6 ASWAN (Assam State Wide Area Network) – Horizontal Connectivity under NEGAP
• The Project “State Wide Area Network for the State of Assam” is to be implemented by the State designated SWAN Implementing Agency i.e., M/s. AMTRON Ltd., Guwahati. Under the ASWAN horizontal connectivity plan the Assam Secretariat is to be linked with other Directorates, Staff College, Senior Officers Colony and the MLA hostel, Residence of Hon’ble Chief Minister of Assam from the following points:

1. From GS Road Secretariat main gate to Power Grid Room in Secretariat
2. From Power Grid room to MLA Hostel Gate
3. From Power Grid Room to CM Block
4. From GS Road Secretariat Main Gate to KAR Bhawan

Common Services Centers (CSC) Project

A. ICT as the Driver for Rural Empowerment

1. ICT can be a powerful enabler of developmental goals as its use can dramatically improve communication and exchange of information to strengthen and create new economic and social networks.
2. ICT is pervasive and crosscutting as it can be applied to the full range of human activity from personal use to business and government. ICT is multifunctional and flexible, allowing for tailored solutions to meet diverse needs of the population. ICT facilitates disinter mediation, as it makes it possible for users to acquire products and services directly from the original provider, reducing the need for intermediaries. ICT is also transparent - it does not differentiate on the basis of economic status, religion or castes of its users.
3. Access to information, backed with relevant infrastructure and services, not only allows rural populace to improve its quality of life but also support and supplement its existing incomes in a sustainable way. Access to information and services like e-Government, micro-credit, literacy, education, health, etc., can provide a solid foundation for the economic prosperity of rural India.
4. Rural consumers are willing to pay for products and services that meet their needs and are offered at affordable prices. Therefore, what Rural India needs is a new social contract - in which there will be common access infrastructure, provided at commercial prices rather than given for free. 

B.     Common Services Centers (CSC)

1. Common Services Centers are envisioned as the front-end delivery points for Government, private and social sector services to rural citizens of India. The idea is to develop a platform that can enable Government, private and social sector organizations to integrate their social and commercial goals for the benefit of rural populations in the remotest corners of the country through a combination of IT as well as non-IT services.
2. The aim of the Scheme is not merely to roll out IT infrastructure but to build a network of 100,000+ rural businesses across India. To that effect, the CSC Scheme has been designed to create a value proposition for all stakeholders and alignment of their economic interests.
3. The CSC Scheme is envisaged to be a bottom-up model for delivery of content, services, information and knowledge, that can allow like-minded public and private enterprises - through a collaborative framework - to integrate their goals of profit as well as social objectives, into a sustainable business model for achieving rapid socio-economic change in rural India.
4. But beyond a delivery channel the CSC can play a role of an effective ?change agent? that would provide a structured platform for socially inclusive community participation for collective developmental activities. Such change, it is proposed, would be undertaken through three important components:   

                    i A Public Private Partnership (PPP) Framework
                   ii Rural Entrepreneurship and Market Mechanismsiii Government policy and support
 
5. An ICT enabled CSC can:

a) Provide citizen centric services of the State and Central Government in a convenient and efficient manner through the CSCs across rural India.
b) Enhance the accountability, transparency and responsiveness of the Government to citizen's needs.
c) Provide efficient and cost effective methods of service delivery to departments and agencies
d) Allow private and social sector to collaborate with the Government to offer world-class services in rural India
e) Train village level entrepreneurs in business and IT management skills
f) Empower the rural citizen through information dissemination and market linkages. 

C. The Structure of the CSC Scheme

1. The Service Centre Agency (SCA) would be the prime driver of the CSC Scheme and the owner of the CSC business. The CSC structure is envisaged as follows:

• Provide citizen centric services of the State and Central Government in a convenient and efficient manner through the CSCs across rural India.
• At the first level would be the Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLEs). The SCA would manage a network of VLEs who in turn would manage the operational business of the CSC at the village level. The VLEs would report to the SCA.
• At the second level would be the Service Centre Agency (SCA). The SCA would be responsible for the overall profitability and sustainability of the CSC business.
• At the third level would be the agency designated by the State- the State Designated Agency (SDA) - to facilitate implementation as well as provide policy guidelines from time-to-time, Government to citizen (G2C) services, and disbursement of financial/revenue support to the SCAs.
• In addition, the DIT, Govt. of India has appointed a National Level Service Agency (NLSA) to support the SDA as well as the SCAs to enable the CSC business in the State

2. The State Designated Agency (SDA): The CSC Scheme would be rolled out in the State through the SDA. The SDA would play three major roles as follows:

• Facilitator for policy, regulatory and other relevant changes with the State Government
• Facilitator for enabling e-Government services
• Enabler for infrastructure and other support to the SCA

3. The Service Centre Agency (SCA): The SCA would be the prime driver of the CSC eco-system. The SCA would be the owner of the CSC network in pre-defined areas of operations in the State. The SCA would undertake activities such as identifying the required applications and services, harnessing the State network, identifying and training the VLE, establishing the CSC (either directly or through the VLE), supplying, aggregating and updating content and services and so on. The SCA would be supported by the NLSA and the respective State Designated Agency (SDA) to implement the CSC Scheme

4. The Village Level Entrepreneur (VLE): The VLE is the key to the success of the CSC operations. A good VLE would be the one who has good entrepreneurial skills, strong social commitment as well as respect within the community. The VLE would manage the CSC business at the ground level. Selection and proper training of the VLE would play a vital role in effective implementation of the CSCs.

5. The National Level Service Agency (NLSA): A project of this scale poses significant challenges of project management at the national level. Significant economies of scale can be achieved in the identification, customization and implementation of the physical and digital infrastructure required for the project. Further, many of the potential citizen-centric services would lend themselves to aggregation at the national level. To enable the State-specific implementation plans to benefit from such economies of scale, aggregation of best practices, content providers, etc., a National Level Service Agency (NLSA) has been appointed by the DIT for facilitating the rollout process in a Public Private Partnership format. 

D. The Implementation Structure

 

E. Connectivity

1. As part of the national e-governance plan (NeGP) of the Government of India (GOI), a State Wide area Network (SWAN) is in the process of being established to provide reliable broadband connectivity across the state up to the block level.
2. Assam State Wide Area Network (ASWAN) has been identified as the core connectivity option for supporting the CSCs. The ASWAN Scheme proposes to establish 2 MBPS connectivity bandwidth up to the block level.
3. Assam can boast of a good ITC infrastructure and all major bandwidth providers are having their presence in the State and expanding their operations.

F. CSC Service Profile

The CSCs would offer a multitude of services ranging in the areas of e-Government, education, health, agriculture, commercial, retail, etc. It is to be noted that delivery of Government services would be mandatory for the CSCs.  

G. Nature of Government Support

1. Only part financial assistance in form of QGR is envisaged under the CSC Scheme from the State Government.
2. The track record of rural projects underscores the need and essentiality for financial support to achieve sustainability around e-Government services. The challenge here is to develop a framework for ascertaining the ?optimum level? of Government support. It is therefore proposed to cover the financial gaps, if any, to make the SCAs rural initiatives and operations towards providing Government and non-Government services, a viable venture. However, such a financial support may not cover all the investment and risks associated with this venture.
3. To ensure sustainability, it is proposed that the SCAs would be provided support in the form of a ?Minimum Financial Support/ Guarantee against Government/citizen services?. The amount of support would be arrived at through a price discovery mechanism through this RFP for the final selection of SCAs.  

H. The Scope of the Project

The State of Assam has 4 revenue divisions covering 27 Districts. Each district has several revenue circles and blocks under them depending upon the geographical coverage and population, currently there are 146 revenue circles and 219 blocks in the State. The circles are divided into mouzas and mouzas are divided into villages. There are 26,247 Census Villages in the State as per Census 2001. For the purpose of deployment of CSC in the State, the districts have been conveniently clubbed into three groups .  

I. Status Of Common Services Centers (CSC) Project

Assam Electronics Development Corporation Ltd. has been nominated as the State Designated Agency (SDA) for implementation of the CSC project, of Govt. of India in the state of Assam on behalf of the Information Technology Dept. , Govt. of Assam. AEDC Ltd. issued the re-tendering notice in all the major national and local newspapers on 18^th August 2007, vide tender no. AEDC/ICT/NeGP/CSC/08, Dtd. 17-8-2007 where it was advertised to invite public / private enterprises/ organizations to participate for establishing and operating approximately 4375 Common Services Centers in the state of Assam.

The role of the selected party / parties, also known as the SCA (Service Centre Agency) would be

• Developing,designing,financing,constructing,establishing,implementing,oper-ating and maintaining the entire Common Services Centers network allotted to the SCA, including its linkage with the State Wide Area Network (SWAN).
• Collating/developing a bouquet of content and services across various verticals to be delivered through these centers. For the purpose of deployment of CSC in the state, the districts have been conveniently clubbed into three groups for bidding purposes. The bidding for the CSC scheme will be for these three groups of districts and the prospective bidders may bid for one or more or all three groups of districts. The groups and districts under each group are tabulated below: 

Sl. No.	Name of Groups	Districts
1.	Group I: Central Assam and Southern Assam ( 1542 No. of CSCs)	Nagaon, Morigaon, Kamrup (Metro), Kamrup (Rural), North Cachar Hills , Cachar, Karimganj, Hailakandi, Karbi Anglong
2.	Group II : Eastern Assam (1303 No. of CSCs)	Tinsukia, Dibrugarh, Sibsagar, Jorhat, Golaghat, Dhemaji, North Lakhimpur
3.	Group III : Western Assam and Northern Assam (1530 No. of CSCs )	Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon, Baska, Dhubri, Goalpara, Nalbari, Barpeta, Darrang, Sonitpur, Chirang, Udalguri

 The last date for sale of the tender document was 31^st August 2007. In this regard 12 (twelve) parties procured the tender documents. 

J. Pre Bid Meeting

The pre bid meeting was held on 7^th September 2007 at the office of the AEDC Ltd. which was attended by officials of IT Dept. Govt. of India, IL&FS , AEDC Ltd and representatives of the prospective bidders. 

K.    Bid Submission & Opening

The bids for the above mentioned tender were accepted upto 3pm on 21^st September 2007. The following 3 (Three) parties submitted their bids.

• M/s Zoom Developers (P) Ltd, New Delhi.
• M/s SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd.( M/s Wipro Ltd, Kolkata is the consortium partner.)
• M/s. Reliance Communication Infrastructure Ltd., Kolkata. 

L.     Technical Bid Opening

The technical bid were opened on 3^rd October 2007 at the office of the AEDC Ltd. which was attended by officials of IT Dept. Govt. of India, IL&FS , AEDC Ltd and representatives of the qualified bidders.

M. Technical Presentations

A meeting was held on 11^Th October 2007 for the technical presentation which was given by representatives of the qualified bidders to the members of the ANIAC committee and officials of AEDC Ltd. 

N.    Review Meeting On Technical Bids

A review meeting of the ANIAC Committee members was held on 10^th December 2007 to evaluate the Technical Qualification (Envelope-B) of the bidders at the office of the Assam electronics Dev. Corporation Ltd.As per the above score the Committee found the following two parties to be eligible for opening of Financial Bid.

 i. M/s Zoom Developers Pvt. Ltd, New Delhi
ii.  M/s SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd. Kolkata 

O. Financial Bid Opening

As per the technical bid evaluation the financial bid for the qualified bidders were opened at 3pm on 10^th December 2007 in presence of the representative of the bidders. 

P. Letter Of Intent

The LOI to the successful bidders were issued on 7^th January 2008 as per given below.       

i. LOI AEDC / ICT/ NeGP/ CSC/ 08 / ZOOM/ 1/2673 Dtd. 7^th Jan 2008 to M/s Zoom Developers Pvt. Ltd. , New Delhi for Group I , 1542 Nos. of CSC     
ii. LOI AEDC / ICT/ NeGP/ CSC/ 08 / SREI/ 1/2667 Dtd. 7^th Jan 2008 to M/s. SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd , Kolkata for Group II , 1303 Nos. of CSC & Group III 1530 Nos. of CSC. 

Q.    Master Service Agreement

The Master Service Agreement (MSA) for the CSC tender has been signed with both the parties as given below. 
 i. MSA signed on 14^th March 2008 with M/s SREI Infrastructure Finance Ltd., Kolkata for Group II & Group III districts of Assam.
ii.  MSA signed on 25^th March 2008 with M/s Zoom Developers (P) Ltd., New Delhi for Group I districts of Assam. M/s SREI, Kolkata has submitted a Bank Guarantee of Rs.40 lacs for two groups as Performance Security valid for a period of 36 months.

M/s Zoom Developers (P) Ltd. , New Delhi has submitted a sum of Rs. 33.47 lacs as Performance Security valid for a period of 12 months. 

R. Integration of CIC with CSC:

The SCA shall integrate the CICs as per the terms and conditions mentioned below:
1. Existing two (2) CIC Operators of each CIC will be preferred in the service of SCA (VLE or VLE Operator), on terms and conditions not inferior to the current ones and on mutually agreed conditions.
2. The physical and IT assets other than the building provided by the Government of India to the CIC centers would be handed over to the SCA as is where basis at nominal cost.
3. Space of Government building where CICs are being located will be given to the SCA on nominal lease basis on mutually agreed terms and conditions. Efforts are to be made to move the CIC functioning in the schools to a suitable outside premise in consultation with the school authorities/State Government.
4. Relocation of CICs, if any, and not covered under para (iii) above, shall require approval of the State. However relocation cost will be by borne by the SCA.
5. The SCA shall relocate (wherever required) and put into operation the existing CICs within seven (7) months from the date of signing the MSA. Any delay in making the unit operational, on accounts of reasons attributed to the SCA, will attract penalty charges at a rate of Rs.500/- per CIC per day.  
6. The SCA will bear the necessary recurring expenditure for utility charges (like electricity, diesel for generator set, phone bill etc.) with effect from handing over of CICs to SCA by State Government.
7. The SCA will have the discretion of using CIC?s present infrastructure for connectivity or using ASWAN as and when required, however attempt will be made to provide free connectivity through ASWAN for delivery of G2C services.
8. The SCA should make every effort to subsume other existing kiosks functioning under the various district level initiative within the ambit of the CSC Scheme.

1. Project Summary:

Assam State Data Center (ASDC) for the State is to consolidate services, applications and infrastructure to provide efficient electronic delivery of G2G, G2C and G2B services. SDC infrastructure shall provide adequate space to house ICT assets of various departments within the state in an environment that meets the need for reliability, availability, scalability, security and serviceability. Various applications and some of the functionalities envisaged at the ASDC include Secure Central Data Repository of the State, Core Application Servers, Service Delivery Gateway, Citizen Information/Services Portal, State Intranet Portal, Remote Management and Service Integration facility.

Assam State Data Centre will act as a mediator and convergence point between open unsecured public domain and sensitive government environment. The ASDC will be equipped to host / co-locate systems such as Web Servers, Application Servers, Database Servers, SAN, and NAS etc.

SDC Building:

The proposed State Data Centre is an important building to be located at Secretariat Complex, Dispur. The building would be the hub of information for people of the state as well as govt. officials. It will facilitate better co-ordination among different departments thus saving valuable time and money. All states in India either have such hubs or are in the process of developing one.

 

 

 

Looking at the nature of the building and activities in it, adequate care has been taken in design stage to make it an example of modern architecture. Latest construction technologies along with energy efficient building practices have been incorporated for maximum performance at effective running cost. Function, aesthetics and a healthy environment are the prime features of this building organism. The building attains highest level of security while also adapts systems to be disable friendly.

Three zones have been created considering the need of high level of protection to the building.

Visitors’ Zone: The ground floor houses facilities such as reception, help desk, large meeting room, video conferencing room etc. is accessible to all visitors.

Server Room Zone: The server area along with its ancillary facilities is housed on the first floor with separate security provisions.

Similarly the future expansion of the server area is housed on the second floor.

Office Zone: The third floor accommodates aswan noc, offices, meeting rooms and a refreshment area.

Service Zone: The terrace provides required space for external units of air conditioners, water tank etc. A separate building away from the main structure accommodates electrical substation and generators.

The structure is a combination of R.C.C. frame and steel.

Material used on the exterior provides protection to the building and add to its aesthetics. Terracotta tile cladding is chosen for exterior finish for the following properties-

Green with 100% natural terracotta as the raw material----
Terracotta cladding products are made of natural pure high quality terracotta clay. They are extruded into shape with high pressure in a vacuum and then fired with high temperature. Besides, they are radioactivity and pollutant free, making them the first choice of Green cladding materials.

1.0.1 Proposed Data Center details:

•  

  • The proposed State Data Center shall have total area of 22000 sqft with 1500 sqft of server farm area.

  • The Data Center capacity has been planned to accommodate approximately Ten (10) 42U racks to take care of the State requirements for the next 5 years.

  • For providing adequate precision cooling it is proposed to provision high density cooling enabled through floor as well as ceiling.

  • Keeping in view the fact that the State has already a number of applications implemented and a big number is in progress it is proposed to have a storage of 75 TB

  • The State has identified the Assam Secretariat Complex as the location of the SDC.

  • The estimated cost of the project is Rs.49.00 Crores.

The Project has already been approved by DIT,Govt. Of India and the Request For Proposal(RFP) is being prepared by M/S PriceWaterHouse Cooper Pvt. Ltd, the consultant of the project.

2. Date of Launch of Project:

AMTRON on behalf of the Govt. of Assam signed an agreement with M/S PricewaterHouse Cooper Pvt. Ltd, the approved consultant of the project on 2^nd May,2008 to kick off the SDC Project.

3. Coverage of the Project:

As the SDC shall be connected through SWAN & Internet cloud, its services will be available throughout the state to various Govt. departments & agencies including CSC operators.

Beneficiary of the projects:

All e-applications initiated by various departments,agencies will take benefit of the project by sharing its resources.

SDC is expected to provide following services and it would be the participating department’s option to avail any or all services:

• Physical & rack space in the Data Center.

• Availability of power and cooling infrastructure and other facility as per SLA.

• Scalability in terms of availability of physical space, racks and supporting infrastructure.

• Foolproof security – locked server cabinets, with IP-based CCTV surveillance and hand key biometric access to all areas.

• 24x7 monitoring of the IT infrastructure.

• Server Management - Periodic system upgrades / updates, patch management, OS support, hardening etc.

• Security Management – physical as well as IT infrastructure security management including firewall Monitoring, configuration updates, Intrusion detection and prevention, antivirus, performing periodic audits etc.

• Database services – database provisioning & allocation.

• Storage Infrastructure including allocation of storage space, administration and management services.

• Backup infrastructure and services.

• Mail and portal services.

• 24x7 availability of help desk.

User Department Requirements:

It is prudent to highlight at this stage that three scenarios exist which impact the decision of the department while availing the services mentioned above. These three scenarios have been evolved keeping in view the different implementation models for application deployment. These three models would include:

i) Total outsourced model: In this model the department would have typically outsourced the application development, deployment, provisioning of required infrastructure and operations of this infrastructure as a whole to an agency, hence would only require the physical and external connectivity infrastructure of the data center.

ii) Partial outsourced model: In this model the department would have some role in the operations of the infrastructure but all application related work is outsourced to the application developer, hence can avail some of the services over an above the physical infrastructure.

iii) In-house model: In this model the department manages the application and the required infrastructure themselves and therefore may approach the IT department for taking over the assets and managing the infrastructure as a whole. This is the most complicated model since the typical data center implementation agency does not posses the application development and management shall need to be taken up by State or IT department/ NIC or any designated agency and shall be dealt with on case to case basis.

Project objective :

State Data Centre (SDC) has been identified as one of the important element of the core infrastructure for supporting e-Governance initiatives of National eGovernance Plan (NeGP).

Under NeGP, it is proposed to create State Data Centres for the States to consolidate services, applications and infrastructure to provide efficient electronic delivery of G2G, G2C and G2B services. These services can be rendered by the States through common delivery platform seamlessly supported by core Connectivity Infrastructure such as State Wide Area Network (SWAN) and Common Service Centre (CSC) connectivity extended up to village level. State Data Centre would provide many functionalities and some of the key functionalities are Central Repository of the State, Secure Data Storage, Online Delivery of Services, Citizen Information/Services Portal, State Intranet Portal, Disaster Recovery, Remote Management and Service Integration etc. SDCs would also provide better operation & management control and minimize overall cost of Data Management, IT Resource Management, Deployment and other costs.

Department of Information Technology (DIT) has formulated the Guidelines to provide Technical and Financial assistance to the States for setting up State Data Centre. These Guidelines also include the implementation options that can be exercised by the State to establish the SDC.

Assam State Data Centre will act as a mediator and convergence point between open unsecured public domain and sensitive government environment. The ASDC will be equipped to host / co-locate systems such as Web Servers, Application Servers, Database Servers, SAN, and NAS etc.

The Government of Assam has completed implementation of a number of e-Governance applications which include Computerization of the Sales Tax department of Assam, Treasury computerization, Integrated Health Services Project, Land Records Computerization, Guwahati Metropolitan Area Network, Transport Computerization Project to name a few. The Government of Assam has also planned a number of e-Governance applications to be deployed in future.

Taking forward its e-Governance initiatives, Assam launched e-District project in Goalpara and Sonitpur districts.

A click of the mouse would now enable one to get access to as many as sixteen different certificates in the two districts.

The project, launched at Goalpara by Assam Information Technology Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, would later on be expanded to other districts of the state.

"The e- District project envisages back- end computerisation of government to citizen (G2C) services at the district level and delivery of these services to the citizens electronically leveraging the Assam State Wide Area network and common service Centres." Assam Electronics Development Corporation Managing Director M K Yadav said.

He added, “The entire process of application processing and verification of such services will be done electronically and the approval or rejection of the service request by the designated authorities at the district administration level will be done online.”

On security part he said that the printouts of the certificates have features like digital signature and two dimensional bar codes. Citizens can collect the printout of such a certificates from the CSCs by paying a nominal fee.

AMTRON in association with Assam State Electricity Board (ASEB) has implemented the broadband over powerline system in 8 Distribution Transformers in Sualkuchi area. Sualkuchi, known as Manchester of East is only 25 Km away from Guwahati and famous for its Assam Silk. A 100 Mbps backbone has been established for Sualkuchi using ADSS OFC. Initially 200 users will be benifitted from the scheme.

The objective of the project is to use existing powerlines upto 220 volt to extend broadband internet upto 2 Mbps and collect meter readings from individual households from a central location.

The facilities are installed in Block office, Sualkuchi Fashion Technology Institute, ASEB office, Schools and individual households.

For the first time in the country this kind of technology has been implemented in a wide scale. Once tested this will be replicated across Assam.