New Delhi, Aug. 4 (IANS): A new research centre at the Delhi Assembly to give recommendations to the House will be functional by September, Speaker Ram Niwas Goel said, adding the Assembly will become paperless by January 2020.
Goel told IANS that the paperless step was needed as too much paper was used in the House.
"Our aim will be that the Assembly becomes totally paperless. Work on it will start next month. It will take around three to four months for implementation. We are expecting that by January 2020 the Assembly will become paperless," he said.
The tenure of the Arvind Kejriwal government ends in February 2020.
For the paperless project, the Delhi government has allocated Rs 20 crore, Goel told IANS.
The Assembly will develop a centralized system. "There will be a display screen on the desks of members. Everything from questions and answers to reports will be available on a touch."
The Assembly wanted to go paperless by the Monsoon session starting this month. But the Lok Sabha elections delayed the process.
"A team visited the Himachal Pradesh Assembly in 2015 to get first-hand knowledge after they went paperless. They (HP) have nearly the same number of MLAs like we do," Goel said.
During the Budget 2019-20, the general purposes committee (GPC) felt the project had been "badly delayed".
For turning paperless, the Assembly will work with the Information and Technology Department of the Delhi government and the National Informatics Centre (NIC).
The GPC had approved the implementation of 'e-Vidhan' in Delhi Assembly and recommended adoption of the Himachal Pradesh model.
Among other reforms, Goel has also initiated a new research centre in the Assembly.
The centre, he said, will act as a recommendation body for the House and, in turn, will help the city government to serve the people better. The centre will start from August-end or early September.
Goel said it was being introduced to create a "repository of valuable research and reference material for use of lawmakers and other stakeholders. It will also help the Assembly in providing quality research and reference material to the MLAs on their demand".
The Delhi government has sanctioned Rs 14 crore for the research centre.
"The need for a research centre arose due to several reasons including what should the government provide to its people and how can these facilities be improved," Goel said.
The centre will study best practices in various fields in other legislatures and governments in and outside India.
"It will provide a comparative study of existing laws and policies in other states and countries. It will publish reports and resource material for use of the MLAs, departments and other stakeholders."
The first batch in the Centre will have 50 Fellows and 100 Associate Fellows. And their selection was almost finalised.
The Fellows will work in close coordination with the MLAs and officers of the Assembly Secretariat as well as with various departments and organizations.
"When AAP came to power, almost all the MLAs were new in politics and in the Assembly. There will be some new in the coming elections as well... The Research Centre will help them."
