CIO Pune completes three year tenure

On the 22^nd of January 2011 the Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement between the PMC, SEAP and Dr Anupam Saraph to establish the Office of the CIO completes its tenure of 3 years. The office had been established to address the information related challenges of the Pune City and the PMC. Under the PPP Dr Anupam Saraph played the role of the CIO of Pune City.

What key benefits has this resulted in for Pune?

1. The PPP arrangement has resulted in several self-help options for Punekars to address various governance and management issues as well as drive development and transaction processes[i] through innovative Information Systems (see accomplishments list below).
2. The PPP arrangement has also resulted in a dramatic increase in transparent, usable, auditable and more secure access to on-line information and transactions with the PMC.

Pune Public Commission of Inquiry 2010

We all witness small and large violations of common-sense and community needs in the development projects across the city. These are usually also a violation of the city's Development Plan (DP) - a document that is supposed to serve as a blueprint to the way our city develops. The DP itself often fails to understand the character and culture of the city and the way it may shape in 10, 20 or 50 years. It is little wonder that an accumulation of these "small" failures has resulted in less than 20% of the DP being implemented, urban chaos (failure to provide water, electricity or telecom, failure to remove waste, failure to ensure smooth flow of traffic, failure of health and hygiene, failure to prevent or manage disasters) and an inability of the city to grow its economic and social potential.

Discover easier commutes on Pune's buses

Tired of driving to or back from Hinjewadi, Magarpatta or Kharadi everyday? Check out the busses you could take on the upgraded version of Pune Transit the application below or open it in a new window.

You can also find out which bus can take you there on your mobile! Just sms PMT your location to Hinjewadi to 092200 92200*!

In a fraction of a minute you will get a message with the routes.

Get your mobile to find your bus!

Want to go shopping to Mandai on Sunday morning? Tired of parking problems along Laxmi road or Mandai? Try the Public Bus.

Find out which bus can take you there on your mobile! Just sms PMT Aundh to Mandai to 092200 92200*!

In a fraction of a minute you will get the message: Routes [21D, 21ND, 25D, 41D, 60D, 88D, 113D, 113AD, 225D, 298D, 322D, 354D] connect [Aundh] to [Mandai]. D is for down routes, U is for up routes. Some routes have other alphabets which simply are part of the route number itself.

Census 2011 in Pune

Census 2011 is on across the country. Many people have been asking questions about the who is conducting it, must they participate, what do they do if they miss it? Here is an information link that you can look at and find your answers, add your questions or even answer the questions posed by others.

Managing Pune's Public Transport

Late March 2010 we had launched the First Version of Pune Transit. I am happy to announce the new version of the application below or open it in a new window.

You can find the busses passing through the location where you are or look for a direct bus between any two points on a map. Yes, we are working on connecting busses, so you can plan a multi-bus journey too, watch out for that soon.

Mapping the thousands of bus-stops across the city is a mammoth task- the bus drivers and conductors are already helping to map them. Out of the over 375 bus routes across Pune We've mapped a several routes and more than a several hundred bus stops (from over thousands). If you know a bus route, you too can help to locate the bus stops on a route on the map just sign in on the application to volunteer.

You can rate the bus route to help capture the best (and worst) user rated routes and why. Many users have been activly rating their bus routes already!

Soon you will be able to rate and submit issues about your bus-stops too. PMPML, are you listening?

Crowd Sourcing Information Systems for Pune

Background


This is an invitation to all CIO's in Pune- an invitation to create shared Information Systems.

As all you CIO's know, Cloud Computing[1] has radically altered the models to deploy software, platforms and infrastructure across user communities. It has brought shared computing power, massive scalability, elasticity of use, pay-as-you-go and self-service scenarios for users.

Web 2.0[2] has opened the potential to tap the collective knowledge of the entire value chain. This has transformed business models to include the long-tail (or many very small niches of customers)  thus radically altering the economics of providing services or deploying “products”.  It significantly altered the ability to exchange information across silos with open models and API’s that facilitate the rapid development and deployment of consumer value through mashups.

Managing mobility in Pune

Here is a placeholder for listing, tracking and crowd-sourcing solutions to mobility issues in Pune.

Pune Issues

Here is a placeholder for listing, tracking and crowd-sourcing solutions to issues in Pune

The Pune H1N1 Wiki

Did you know about that you can help yourself and the city to deal with H1N1 on a wiki? Here is the place where you can crowd-source to collaborate, coordinate and deal with H1N1.

Containing the H1N1

H1N1 is spreading. The response is still uncoordinated, slow, confused, messy and lacking a clear direction. What could a coordinated, quick, focused response look like? Here is a first look at a better coordinated system.

What if you could help yourself?
If you’ve got flu, you should be able to register yourself on phone, through an sms or on the internet. A quick set of questions should be able to assess if you need to be tested for H1N1. If you do, then the information system should schedule you for test on one of the 15 mobile collection centers closest to your home. You should be intimated during your conversation the expected time when the unit will visit you and conduct the test. At the same time the mobile unit would be sent an SMS of your location. The blackberry on the mobile unit would indicate the google map of your location and allow them to update the information system as soon as the sample is collected.

Pune Giki

Did you know about the Pune Governance Wiki? Here is the place where you can crowd-source governance and collaborate to build your city.

Life with a Punecard

Punecards is round the corner if you wish it. It may no longer be a dream of the distant future. But we need to desire it strongly enough before it happens. What will a Punecard world look like? What will you be willing to do to make this a reality?

Do you participate in the governance of your ward?

How many people live in your electoral ward? How many families is that?

What is the ecological footprint of your ward? How much electricity can be supplied to your ward, what is the demand? How many million litres of Petrol/Diesel does your ward need, everyday? How many cars (or maybe bikes) are registered in your ward? Or by-the-way how many can park or drive in the ward?

How many bus routes (or bus trips) ply how many people (r what percentage) from your ward everyday (for work, to school or to markets?)? Do you know the congestion points (and times) of places in your ward?

How many new building permissions were granted this month in your ward? How many new tenements or commercial establishments or Sq Ft Commrcial space will that be? How many Ha of open spaces, play grounds and gardens exist in your ward?

Are there any waterbodies that are being conserved in your ward? How many tons of green or non-green solid waste or sewage does your ward generate and treat? How many million litres of water does your ward consume or fall short of every day? How much of it comes from the wards own rainwater harvesting?

How many people are born, marry, die, move into or move out of your ward every day?

Do you participate in the governance of your ward? Use the map to locate your ward, share and view information.

Tweet for Pune!

Imagine you could SMS to everyone. Imagine you could let everyone know there is a traffic jam at the University circle. Imagine you could send out an invite to the tree-planting drive on the Baner Hill. Imagine you could message the world that admissions open for the educational course you have been waiting for. Imagine you message out reports of malaria in your neighborhood or choose to report births, deaths, suspicious activities, new shops, sale offers, rentals….

Using a Wiki for Governing Pune

The growing city

Just 10 years ago Kothrud, Warje, Hadapsar, Viman Nagar, Sinhagad Road, Satara Road, Kondhwa, Mundhwa, Aundh, Baner Road, Wakad etc. were yet opportunities for planned development. Just two years ago the JNNURM was an opportunity to renew Pune.

With two Municipal Corporations and three Cantonment Boards in addition to a dozen or more other Governance agencies constituted to implement an act (rather than govern the city), it is no wonder that the bounds of the act wall the city’s ability to govern itself.

Requesting a Service from your Government Agency

With support from numerous NGO’s, government officials and IT companies in Pune, the Office of the CIO has designed and deployed a Service Request System developed by Persistent at the Pune Municipal Corporation. They still prefer to call it as the Grievance Redressal System (GRS). Hopefully a look at the best practices will help them to move ahead enlarging the scope of services and renaming it to Service Request System.

City Resource Planning

Pune's population doubles roughly in 7-8 years. By 2015 the Pune region can be expected to be close to 8 million people and by 2025 well near to 20 million people. The information systems in Pune are not equipped to deal with this growth or volume. The government agencies are also not equipped to face the challenges.

Pune 2015

Pune 2015. Of the 4 million, over 3 million citizens of Pune are using Pune-card and most of them keep track of the card-transactions through their ilife account. About 5 percent users still prefer a quarterly paper-statement of their ilife.

Creating Collaboration in Governments

Wikis
Wiki’s are websites that allow users to add, remove, edit and change content. Unlike typical websites wikis are invitations to collaborate, self-organize and create order from chaos.

The best-known wiki is Wikipedia, the free content collaborative encyclopedia with over 7.2 million articles. In March 2000 Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger initiated the then radical goal of creating a publicly editable encyclopedia. Today Wikipedia is ranked amongst the top 15 most visited sites in the world and its publicly edited content is recognized by Nature as having similar accuracy as the Encyclopedia Britannica.