The Ministry of Information and Communication has developed an integrated application—GoN Citizen App—aimed at providing citizens access to information and services of all three tiers of government.

In the policy and programme issued on May 21, the government has stated that arrangements will be made to deliver services to the general public digitally.

“Citizen’s Rights Mobile App will be introduced to provide easy information on government services and enable people to register their complaints and suggestions directly to the institutions and officials concerned,” the policy and programme states.

As per the government’s policy, the ministry has developed the app that will also house the official web portal of Nepal Government www.nepal.gov.np. The web portal contains all vital information of the government, including that of the Office of Prime Minister and Council of Ministers.

The National Information Technology Centre (NITC) has developed the app—on both the android and ios mobile operating systems—by outsourcing to IT programmers.

Information related to the 753 local levels would be gradually incorporated into the app, with 76 local units already requesting the government to include their details which will take two months, according to Birendra Kumar Mishra, chief of the Information Technology Division at the ministry. He said the government had completed the Vulnerable Assessment Penetration Testing (VAPT) test on the app.

“We have tried everything possible to make this app fully secured,” he said.

Like many other Asian countries, mobile services industry has witnessed a significant growth in Nepal over the past 4-5 years.

According to the Nepal Telecom Authority, mobile penetration in Nepal has grown exponentially in the last decade from 21 percent in 2009 to 113 percent in 2017. This growth pattern is expected to continue over the next five years.

Internet penetration is also growing at a phenomenal rate of 6-7 percentage points annually, according to the Nepal Telecom Authority (MIS reports), World Bank.

Nepal’s ICT Development and Broadband Policy-2015 states that the government is undertaking steps to expand internet connectivity as part of its vision of a digital society with 90 percent of the population having access to broadband services by 2020.

A team led by Secretary Kedar Bahadur Adhikary has been formed at the Prime Minister’s Office to monitor the development and management of the app. Besides the information of local, provincial and federal governments, the app will enable the public to access information of all the departments and other agencies.

The app will contain information about the government agencies and their services, Secretary Adhikari explained. “We are planning to launch the app in the third week of September with a limited number of government agencies. But the citizens will have access to wider services later on.”