Procurement of goods and services is one of the important activities of the Government. Substantial amount of money is being spent towards procurement covering Goods, Works and Services across the country. In view of its importance, the Government has identified e-Procurement as one of the Mission Mode Projects (MMP) under the National e-Governance Plan (NeGP). Department of Commerce has given the responsibility to NIC for implementing the e-Procurement solution developed by NIC in the State Governments under the MMP. In the case of central government organizations, in pursuance to the recommendations of the Committee on Public Procurement and the decisions thereon of the Group of Ministers constituted to consider measures to tackle corruption and ensure transparency, the Department of Expenditure has taken action for setting up a Central Public Procurement Portal (CPP Portal) through NIC and move towards e-Procurement in a phased manner.

The e-Procurement System will enable disclosure of information on procurements made across various government organizations. It aims at transparency and non discrimination amongst bidders, by allowing free access to tender documents, clarifications, secure online bid submission and access to bid opening event to participating bidders from any place through Internet.

The objective under MMP is to implement e-Procurement System in all State Governments by March 2013.  In the case of Central Government organizations, e-Publishing of tender enquiries and related details are made mandatory for adoption in all the Central Government organizations by April 2012.

e-Procurement System Developed By NIC

NIC has developed a generic e-Procurement solution called GePNIC (Government e-Procurement system from NIC) which can easily be adopted by the government organizations for all kinds of procurement activities such as Goods, Services and Works. The system has been designed taking into account the tender rules followed in various states and the CVC’s guidelines on tendering. The system provides secured access to the site using Digital Signature Certificate and has role based access to the departmental officials.

The main functionalities covered under GePNIC are - Registration of Government officials under different roles; Registration of Bidders; Tender Creation (Multiple Covers) and Publishing; Publishing of Corrigendum and decisions of Pre-bid meeting; Online Bid submission by the Bidders; Online Tender opening and decryption of Bids at various stages; Evaluation of Tenders; and Award of Contract.
Security Features of GePNIC

The GePNIC system has strong in-built security features including two-factor Authentication with Digital Signature Certificates (DSCs) as per IT Act, usage of Secured Socket Layer (SSL), Role-based User Access and Bid-encryption at client-end using PKI technologies. The GePNIC system has been security audited by STQC and other third party agencies.

Implementation Status

 The GePNIC system is in use since November 2007 and more than 97,000 e-Tenders have been floated using the system with procurement value worth more than ` 125,000 crores.
 It has been implemented successfully in 16 State Governments till Dec 2011.
 Implemented for procurements under Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) of Rural Development Ministry in 21 states including some of the North Eastern states.
 Implemented in Directorate General of Supplies & Disposal (DGS&D), Mahanadi Coal Fields Limited (MCL), Visakhapatnam Port Trust, NICSI and others
 The Central Public Procurement Portal has been launched on 1st January 2012 in association with Department of Expenditure (http://eprocure.gov.in).

Rollout Model

Under MMP, the cost towards back-end hardware, storage and related systems required at the Data Centre are taken care of by the Department of Commerce for implementation in 23 States. The end users will have to take care of only the front-end resources such as Desktop system, NICNET/Internet connectivity, Printer and Scanner. In the case of central government of organizations, NIC will take care of the back-end hardware, storage and related systems at the Data Centre. For providing handholding support, NIC has created 24x7 Helpdesk facility with a toll free number.

For additional hand-holding support and training, the implementing organizations can make use of the roll out agencies empanelled by NICSI, as per the needs of the organizations. The rollout model for GePNIC solution does not envisage any fee/charge from suppliers/bidders for their portal registration or bid submissions.

* Inputs from the Department of Information Technology.
* The views expressed by the author in this feature are entirely his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of SME Times.