The Government of Himachal Pradesh today entered into an agreement with the consortium of M/s Tera Software Ltd. and M/s GNG trading Pvt/Ltd. to establish Common Service Centres (CSC) in Shimla and Mandi Division. 2070 centres are to be setup in all the Panchayats of both divisions. The agreement was signed by Shri B. K. Agarwal, Secretary IT on behalf of the Government of Himachal Pradesh. Sh. Subhasish Panda, Director, Information Technology and other officers of the Department were also present on the occasion. On 30th August the State Government had signed a similar agreement with M/s Zoom Developers Pvt. Ltd. for establishing 1296 CSCs in Kangra Division.

The project is being executed in a Public Private Partnership mode where the private parties will be setting these centres in phased manner within one year. The private partners will setup IT infrastructure and identify village level entrepreneurs to operate the centres. These centres will optimally have internet access along with computer hardware and necessary peripherals like web camera, scanners and printers. The private partners will be able to extend Government services through these centres for which they will able to charge a nominal facilitation fee. These centres will offer host of services under a single roof in the rural areas. The service mix will include Government services such as Voter registration, Voter ID Card, Police complaint registration, Vacancy listings, Passport enquiry status, School Board results, REFNIC, High court cause list, Government information & forms through websites.   The other services to be offered in the centres are computer education, examination results, vocational education, microfinance, agriculture related services, utility bill payments, railway and bus bookings. A citizen in the rural area would be able to access the above services from his local area of residence without having to visit the District and Sub division Head quarters or respective offices. 

The Department of Information Technology is further identifying and facilitating the process of adding more Government services to be extended through these centres. Also a series of workshops and seminars are being planned to sensitise the Government functionaries at all levels about the benefits to the citizens for extending services through these centres.