The Essence of e-Governance in the Modern Era of Indian Public Administration Today

In today's society the pace of change is immensely faster, and it will only continue to accelerate more in near future. Organizations and people that don't embrace change are bound to lose ground and remain stagnate. Thus, as an eventual consequence every government in the modern world has started imparting changes in the administration in order to cope with the altering circumstances around. The traditional pattern and processes of administration have undergone critical analysis by this time. Its excessive dependence on bureaucracy, hierarchy, rules and regulations was proved to be ineffective in delivering proper services to the citizens and when the twenty first century was seen to be characterised by the impact of globalization which has the potential to transform the social, cultural, economic and political arena worldwide in one way or another, the net effect is the need for change and innovation in the delivery of public services. Since 1990s, the concept and practice "reinventing government‟ has been getting much attention among the advocacy for transforming the public administration. The concept of 'good governance' as a result emerged in 1989 through a World Bank Report and thereafter the objective of attaining 'good governance' through various ways of 're-inventing' government started gaining much consideration. This paper attempts to trace the essence of e-government in the modern era of Indian Public Administration today as another new paradigm shift is in the offspring and slowly becoming distinct from the amorphous shape of Public Administration in the Indian context with the ICT-blessed governance, or e-Governance.