HYDERABAD: As many as 15,000 applications for birth and death certificates have been pending with the eSeva centres in all the 18 circles of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) since April 5 due to various technical glitches.
If on one day, it is a “network problem”, the other day either the “servers are down” or there is an “issue with the software”. These are the reasons being cited by officials for every visiting applicant these past two weeks.
Officials at the eSeva centres claim they are unable to issue the certificates because of these technical problems cropping at the GHMC’s IT wing. When contacted, GHMC Commissioner M T Krishna Babu told City Express that the problem had been sorted out and the birth and death certificates and correction certificates were being issued promptly at the eSeva centres. “The eSeva centres have issued 10,000 certificates in the last three days and the remaining applications will be cleared in the next three to four days,” he said.
The problems arose due to the transfer of a few assistant medical officers (health) and the ongoing repatriation of some of them to their parent departments. Generally, AMOHs have digital keys which are used to download data. In certain GHMC circles, currently there are no AMOHs at all which has led to the piling up of applications.
“To solve the problem, we have handed over two digital keys to the two Deputy Municipal Commissioners. There is a problem in about three circles and this problem would be sorted out in two to three days. We have given stern warning to the GHMC IT wing officials to sort out the problems and see that people are not inconvenienced,” Krishna Babu said.
The issue has attracted political attention too with TDP floor leader, GHMC Singireddy Srinivas Reddy pointing out that the civic body was incurring `80 lakh for maintenance of IT infrastructure. “Add to that, the salaries of the IT section in GHMC amounts to `28 lak per annum. When such a huge amount is being spent, where is the scope for failure even if it is technical?” he wondered and added that if the GHMC cannot issue birth and death certificates even through eSeva centres, the very purpose of all these efforts would be wasted.