The Ministry of Communications and Information Technology on Monday unveiled an action plan that includes 10 major reform programs with the aim of making public service delivery citizen-friendly, fast, transparent and technology-friendly.

In accordance with the decision of the Council of Ministers on Chaitra 13, the ministry has prepared an action plan by specifying major tasks, performance indicators, deadlines and responsible officers to make the results-based management system effective, the statement said.

The reform program made public by the Ministry of Communications

Under this, the first point is that an integrated application system will be launched within 45 days by interconnecting services including police reports, passports and driving licenses through the Nagarik app. ‘The system for receiving police reports from the Nagarik app has already been implemented,’ it said.

The ministry plans to develop the postal service as a government courier within 90 days with the aim of delivering government services to doorsteps. Review of postal routes by mid-Baishakh 2083 The ministry has approved a program to arrange for documents including passports, driving licenses, educational certificates and Nepal Telecom SIM cards to be delivered to distribution centers in all districts through post. The ministry has stated that health test samples will also be transported safely to the laboratory through this.

In the third point, the ministry has stated that an arrangement has been started to print and hand over driving licenses through the Security Printing Center within 24 hours of receiving the details from the Department of Transport Management. The government aims to complete the remaining 2.9 million licenses by mid-Asad 2083.

‘In collaboration with the Nepal Telecommunication Authority, mobile data services will be improved and customers will be notified after 90 percent of the data is used, and customers will be given the option to deactivate ‘Pay as you go,’’ point 4 states, ‘A system will be implemented to operate mobile data services on a subscription model.’ Ncell has been advocating this model for some time now. In the subscription model, the user pays a fixed fee regularly under a monthly or weekly plan to continue using the service.

Currently, the prepaid model is more popular, where many users recharge and buy data or voice packs. Once a plan is selected in the subscription model, it is automatically renewed every month. Service providers have seen the subscription model as an alternative, citing the continuous decline in the income of telecom companies and the difficulty in raising the necessary investment for service operation.

Similarly, the ministry plans to make more than 250 government websites and mobile apps disability-friendly and user-friendly. It is said that they will be updated so that even citizens with less technical knowledge can use them easily, and video content will also be prepared to help users. The ministry had issued the 'Guidelines on the Construction and Management of Government Office Websites' in Bhadra 2078, stating that the construction and publication of government office websites and publications should be made accessible to people with disabilities.

However, government websites and apps still have content that can be read by 'screen readers' used by visually impaired users. Most sites do not run without a mouse. There are no subtitles or captions in videos. There is no alt text in photos. This has made it difficult for people with disabilities to get information.

The sixth point of the ministry's reform program states that additional frequencies will be provided for quality improvement by revising the policy arrangements related to 4G services within 30 days. It has been said that the 'One Time KYC' system will be implemented in Nepal Telecom's services within 30 days. Accordingly, the customer will not have to resubmit the details provided once.