When Document Management Systems was being developed for the first time by world-wide vendors, there was talk that eventually this idea would lead to a paperless office. It is with this aim the system evolved rapidly, and what started initially as a system designed to only track, manage and store digital documents, the scope extended to documents, prints and photographs. With so many advances being made in these systems, some of the vendors started calling it as Document Imaging System because it could capture, store, index, and retrieve any type of file formats. However, the big breakthrough came when documents captured in the form of images started extracting text in the document with the help of the text-indexer. A game changing development that made retrieving data became so simple, literally at our fingertips.
Ok, not at everybody’s fingertips, but the ones that had access to the data storage systems. That was probably the right way to go about with this type of system, because documents of a certain company, was the property of that particular entity, and there was no business for others to be given access. But things changed and many forward thinking companies started opening its documents or forms to existing and prospective customers or users.
Meantime, companies in their sincere quest to turn their offices into a paperless one, developed the system further and designed what was called the workflow management systems, whereby a document would be routed through an organization among various designated user’s who would complete their part of the task, and the next user in line would automatically be notified so that he or she would complete their part of the task. Quite simply, a document or a file would travel electronically through the organization with the concerned user completing their portion of the task or even grant approvals as the case maybe. However, conservative companies that were not confident enough or ready for such a huge change, continued with the manual system but made sure they used document management systems as a parallel arrangement, so that retrieving documents become easy from their data repository.
The above technology is not something new, infact many institutions, companies and governments all over the world have been using it for decades, inorder to compete, increase efficiency and make their employees more productive. Recently in Goa, there was so much talk over some missing file, which it seems, would help authorities nail the corrupt. Really; in which age is Goa living, when technology that was made available to the world long ago is not put to use. Is it because of lack of funds, or knowhow, or simply lack of will? Or is it a deliberate ploy to keep things manual as much as possible, so that human intervention can be used to alter or change data at any given time.
For a moment just disregard all of the above, assuming successive governments of the past could not understand the complex world of digitizing documents or its management or did not put that extra effort to modernize. Take the example of a Goan of the present time who uses the facilities cloud computing has to offer. Armed with a smart phone he or she has access to apps such as Google Docs, Dropbox etc which some use to save their personal documents and files so that they can access them on the go. Go a little lower and most Goan use the popular Facebook, where they take photos and post it on their homepage, so as to share it to the world or organize it for easy retrieval. If the pictures are old, they even know how to digitize that image and post it on their home page. So nobody carries their photo albums, wherever they go, and yet have access to it through their phone. Practically every clerk with even the lowest of IQ in a government office knows to operate it. This kills the government excuse that its staff will not be able to handle technology. In that case, why can’t the government introduce document management system in the working and moving of files, at least as a parallel arrangement?
This step will need disruptive thinking, cutting of the extra fat in terms of personnel, and eliminating absurd procedures which will make every politician almost powerless. Once a system is in place which does not require politician’s intervention, the power of the politician will automatically be cut to size. Prime Minister Modi has done immense work compared to the previous government, but he must know he was elected not to better his predecessor but to completely change the way bureaucracy functions in India. He must go beyond introducing the well accepted self-attesting documents to digitizing documents.
Goa is the ideal place to initiate a project of digitizing documents, where every citizen’s documents are digitized in a central repository and access given to all government offices. So when a citizen walks in a government office, he comes hands-free, requests a service and does not have to carry any documents with him, not even an application on plain piece of paper. Technology is inevitable, while politicians will try and delay it, and even hassle some bureaucrats who implement it, it’s just a matter of time a Goan realizes the power of their smart phone and demand such service.
(Plastino D’Costa is a business consultant)
