Rajesh Kumar Singh, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Heavy Industries & Public Enterprises, Department of Heavy Industry, Government of India, spoke to Express Computer about the IT implementations that are being carried out in the Public Sector Undertakings
What is your view of the IT implementations that the PSE sector is having in India?
BHEL, one of India’s largest engineering and manufacturing company, has a full-fledged ERP system. The company is doing very well. Over the years it has been able to use new solutions from IT to improve its efficiency and productivity. But not every PSU is doing as well as BHEL when it comes to IT implementations. For instance, at Scooters India Limited we are now trying to evolve a centralised ERP system. We are hopeful that soon all the PSUs will have the necessary IT systems in place for improving efficiency and transparency.
Department of Heavy Industry (DHI) is developing IT modules for implementation in Public Sector Units. Please tell us about the project.
This project is currently in the planning stage. DHI is planning to develop IT modules for e-Office, Financial Management, Inventory Management, HR Management, Sales Management, etc. Once the modules are ready, all 32 PSUs under the administrative control of DHI will use them in their own organisation. As the needs of different PSUs vary according to the nature of their business and other factors, the modules will be such that each PSU can make appropriate changes to make the IT system compatible with their exact needs. The PSUs can make changes not only in the software that goes into the modules but also the hardware. Only the core system will be developed by DHI, the system that gets implemented will have all kinds of improvements to meet the precise needs of any particular PSU.
You said earlier that an ERP solution for Scooters India Ltd is in the works. What kind of improvements do you expect to bring with this ERP implementation?
Recently the production at Scooters India Ltd came to a halt. When we tried to ascertain the reason for that we were told that on the inventory side we had run out of washer. Now washer is a very small component, it costs very less, but it performs the important task of protecting two components that are in constant touch with each other. The register that is manually maintained showed that roughly 60,000 washers are in the stock, but in reality there is no stock. It was then that we realised that the manual system for maintaining inventory does not work. If we had proper Inventory Management System, we could have been alerted in time that we are now close to running out of wasters and it is time to get more inventory. At Scooters India limited, we are in touch with leading Information Technology companies for the creation and implementation of an appropriate ERP solution. We are evaluating the ERP solutions that different IT companies are providing. Soon we will be coming up with a tender.
How difficult is it to computerise the operations in Public Sector Units?
Today all businesses understand that implementation of IT solutions is necessary for bringing efficiency to their operations. But it is also true that any change is initially opposed by the system. This is true, not only for the PSUs, but for every entity. If you go deep into the human psychology, you will find that most people prefer status quo. Even in BHEL, the IT initiatives took up to an year to be fully implemented. And after the implementation, some of the employees were uncomfortable with the computerised system and they continued to use the manual system for few months. After that everyone in the organisation became comfortable with the IT systems and things became very smooth. Today there is no doubt in the mind of anyone that the company and its employees have benefitted immensely from the IT implementations. My point it is only after an Information Technology system has been fully implemented that most people will understand its benefits.
Please tell us about the eGovernance systems that are being implemented internally by DHI.
DHI is in the process of implementing the eOffice mission mode project. This project has already been implemented to a certain extent, as we have converted lot of files into e-files. Our leave management system is completely online. The tour management system is also online. We are not doing any paperwork for applying for leave or applying for tour. Recently we have started the Aadhaar linked biometric attendance system in the ministry.