NEW DELHI, Mar 9: Stalemate on resumption of peace dialogue notwithstanding, there is a strong feeling among the people from both India and Pakistan for sharing their respective experiences to improve their life through better governance.
A group of legislators from both the countries have proposed setting up of a joint knowledge portal for sharing their experience in good governance.
People’s representatives of the two countries met at Dubai at a conference on the issue and came to the conclusion that tremendous opportunity for exchange and sharing of information exists between Pakistan and India on a variety of technology-enabled initiatives.
According to a joint statement issued at the end of the conference, the participants showed particular interest in the models of Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP), monitoring of immunisation programmes, Aadhaar authentication (Unique ID), e-Procurement, Smart Cities, e-Cloud for Citizens, land record management and Unified Payment Interface.
The legislators underscored that technology has immense potential to improve governance in Pakistan and India.
They recognised that while tremendous strides have been made across Pakistan and India in using technology for improved governance, so there existed a lot of room for sharing of good practices between the two countries.
The participants said that while use of technology by Governments provided a critical platform to improve the quality of life of citizens, governments must do so while maintaining the security of data and privacy of citizens.
They underscored that real changes in structures of governance to guard against corruption and other systemic ills must accompany and complement the use of technology to improve governance.
The event, which came to a close yesterday, had been organised under the aegis of Pakistan-India Legilslator and Public Officials Dialogue on Sharing of Experiences on Governance and Democracy.
The Dialogue included Members of Parliament and Provincial Assemblies of Punjab and Sindh, alongside experts and media representatives from Pakistan, who joined Members of the Indian Parliament from Assam, Haryana and Karnataka and State Legislatures of Delhi and Gujarat, along side experts and media representatives from India.
The delegates from India included former Union minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, Congress MPs Sushmeta Dev Prof Rajiv Gowda, INLD member, AAP MLA from Delhi Madan Lal, Congress MLA from Gujarat Shakti Singh Gohil and others.
The Pakistani delegation included Members of National Assembly (MNA) Muhammad Talal Chaudhry, Dr Arif Alvi, Members of Provincial Assembly Ayesha Javed, Azma Bukhari and Mian Mehmood ur Rashid, among others. (UNI)
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