[Paper Review] Improved Service Delivery and Cost Effective Framework for e-Governance in India

Puneet Kumar, Dharmender Kumar+1 more|arXiv (Cornell University)|Jul 29, 2013

Smart Cities and Technologies6 references13 citations

TL;DR

This paper proposes a cost-effective e-governance framework for India integrating Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), virtualization, consolidation, and cloud computing to reduce infrastructure costs and improve service accessibility. By leveraging these technologies, the framework significantly cuts Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), enhances scalability, and ensures inclusive delivery of e-services to rural and marginalized populations.

ABSTRACT

In current era, the involvement of technologies like virtualization, consolidation and cloud computing, and adoption of free and open source software in designing and deploying e-governance that can reduce the total cost associated with and hence the financial burden abide by the state and central governments. The success of any e-governance project depends upon its utilization by the intended group and so there accessibility needs to be enhanced drastically by reengineered framework. Here, we design an Improved Service Delivery and Cost Effective Framework for e-Governance that will be useful for success of e-governance projects and the delivery mechanism in India by using free and open access software for development and deployment of e-governance applications, virtualization and consolidation techniques for management of e-services and cloud computing for enhancing the accessibility of services.

Motivation & Objective

• To reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) in Indian e-governance projects through technology integration.
• To enhance accessibility of e-services for rural and marginalized populations.
• To reengineer the current e-governance delivery model to overcome failure rates from poor planning and vendor lock-in.
• To promote interoperability and scalability in e-governance applications through standardized FOSS and virtualization.
• To establish a government cloud (G-Cloud) model to centralize and streamline service delivery.

Proposed method

• Adopts Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) for application development and deployment to eliminate licensing costs and vendor lock-in.
• Applies server, storage, network, and client virtualization to consolidate physical infrastructure and improve resource utilization.
• Uses consolidation techniques to reduce the number of physical servers, storage units, and data center footprint.
• Introduces a Government Cloud (G-Cloud) model based on utility computing to deliver scalable, on-demand e-services.
• Employs service-oriented architecture (SOA) to enable interoperability and reduce data redundancy across applications.
• Standardizes FOSS nationwide to ensure scalability, security, and long-term maintainability of e-governance systems.

Experimental results

Research questions

• RQ1 How can FOSS reduce TCO and improve sustainability in Indian e-governance projects?
• RQ2 To what extent can virtualization and consolidation lower hardware, power, and real estate costs in Government Data Centers (GDCs)?
• RQ3 Can cloud computing significantly improve accessibility of e-services in remote and underserved rural areas?
• RQ4 What are the key technical and managerial challenges in deploying a national G-Cloud infrastructure?
• RQ5 How can interoperability and data consistency be enhanced across decentralized e-governance applications?

Key findings

• The framework reduces TCO by minimizing hardware procurement, software licensing, and energy consumption through virtualization and consolidation.
• Case studies show a 75% reduction in servers (from 400 to 75) and 75% reduction in floor space at Hi3G Access AB, with improved application performance.
• EDIF of Italy reduced operational costs by 75% through virtualization, and Le Bourget Communauté saved 20% in total costs with ongoing power savings.
• iTricity in the Netherlands reduced operational costs by 30–35% and asset utilization by 25–30% over three years via virtualization.
• The adoption of G-Cloud models in Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, and China demonstrates scalable, cost-effective, and environmentally sustainable e-governance infrastructure.
• The framework enables scalable, secure, and interoperable e-governance by standardizing FOSS and integrating virtualization and cloud services across government systems.