Education
Background
School Education Department budgets approximately 80% of its total spending’s on the payment of Salaries of teaching and non-teaching staff of the schools under its purview. In the year 2011-12 the amount budgeted for the aforementioned purpose is to the tune of INR 25000 Cr.
In spite of such humungous spending, the Department has been frequently receiving various complaints from the school employees about untimely payments of salaries, improper practices conducted while payment of salaries to the employees, etc. Besides, these there has also been concern from the officials working for the Department on the ground level that they have to spend a lot of time in salary related data collection and resolving issues every month instead of focusing on ensuring quality education to the students, which is their primary responsibility.
Taking into consideration the above situation, School Education Department, GoM, with active guidance from Directorate of Information Technology (DIT) and support from Directorate of Accounts and Treasuries (DAT) has undertaken an e-governance project that shall enable the Department to pay the salaries of the teaching and non-teaching staff of about 87000 schools under its purview through an online system.
The aim of Department undertaking such kind of a project is to pay the right amount of salaries to the individuals at the right time. The total number of school employees that shall be covered through this system would be approximately 7.5 lakh and approx 20000 private Aided Schools, 62000 Zilla Parishad Schools and 5000 Municipal Corporation Schools shall be covered.
Customisation of Sevaarth
Sevaarth system (IFMS) used by the Directorate of Accounts and Treasuries was customized by TCS to make it suitable to the needs of the Education Department.
Project implementation was handed over to a core committee formed under Directorate of Accounts and Treasuries.
Benefits:
- The project is estimated to save a sizeable amount of the Government through corrections in Number of Employees working in schools.
- The employees shall receive salaries into the UID linked bank accounts thus reducing immoral practices and thus complaints.
- The ground staff shall be able to focus on their primary responsibility of improving quality of education.
- Help in Standardizing operating procedure for all the types of Schools
- Accurate accounting with built in responsibility matrix leading to proper accountability
Pilot Implementation:
A pilot project for Shalarth was undertaken at the 4 districts of Mumbai, Thane, Pune and Latur wherein 13 Schools were selected for going through the data entry and bill generation process. The pilot Go-Live at these 13 schools was done on 13th August 2012.
Approach and Current Status:
School Education Department, anticipating the unprecedented data entry that is supposed to take place while the implementation, has decided upon an approach that shall enable capacity building and shall help percolate the responsibility of data entry to the lowest possible level. The Department has decided to prepare approximately 5000 Master Trainers which shall comprise of the existing school staff and the MIS Coordinator’s at the Block level. These Master Trainers in turn shall have the responsibility to train approximately 20 schools each that shall be allotted to them, thus making the process streamlined.
The Shalarth implementation has gained momentum post the Pilot Go-Live and is currently being rolled out in the all the schools of the pilot districts. The trainings of the Master trainers and the end level trainers have been completed and configuration and data entry stage has been initiated in the pilot districts of Mumbai, Thane, Pune and Latur. The data entry and bill generation through the Shalarth System is planned to be completed by 15th of December 2012.
Future Plan:
A project plan indicating the roll out of Shalarth System in the Rest of Maharashtra has been published by the Department and Master Trainings in other districts shall initiate from 5th of December 2012. It is estimated that the whole state shall be on the Shalarth System by the end of February and the bills for February paid in March shall be generated for all the schools form the Shalarth System.
Picture of Shalarth Home Page:
