THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Denizens of the state will not have to make multiple, harrowing trips to local body offices for their needs, be it regarding building taxes or welfare pensions. Now, all they have to do is visit their nearest Akshaya Centre.
Around 2,654 Akshaya centres in the state would be revamped to provide services they were missing till now. These include all services from local bodies, Motor Vehicles Department, other government departments, utility payments, to name a few. The Kerala State IT Mission (KSITM) is coordinating with various departments to streamline its services.
“We are working with various departments to activate the digital service. In a few months, all citizen-centric services will be available through Akshaya centres,” said KSITM Director Seeram Sambasiva Rao.
The government aims to reduce people’s complaints of delay and the time wasted in getting the services, by gradually moving most services to neighbourhood Akshaya centres.
“In case of Thiruvananthapuram corporation, the long delay in getting birth and death certificates were raised by councillors in several council meetings. At present, these services are unavailable through Akshaya centres and people here had to approach agents to get rightful services from Corporation, be it building permit, occupancy certificate and others,” said Thiruvananthapuram Corporation Councillor V Giri.
Rebranding Akshaya
KSITM is planning to re-brand Akshaya Centres as skill-development centres in Information Technology and IT-Enabled Services. KSITM Director Seeram Sambasiva Rao said select centres will provide a three-level certification programme in IT, data-entry and business process outsourcing. “The centres will provide certification. Skilled certificate holders can be employed to meet the centres’ expanding role,·he said. KSITM will also open a portal to help entrepreneurs find outsourcing work.