How Digital Transformation Changing over Lives: Indian Passport Seva

We live in a world of cliche and buzzwords, along with technology innovations that is reshaping our lifestyles. So the relevant question -is the Digital Transformation just a current buzz or for real! If it is real, how is it affecting our lives?

Let us take a before and after example: Indian passport application was one of the worst experience, not so long ago. Unhygienic, unventilated office filled with unruly crowds and for-a-fee agents. It was like living through a sequel of Nightmare on the Elm Street, that showed you how bad third world government services are. No one knew for sure which documents you needed, nor was there visibility on when you will get new passport. Costlier agent you used, further away you got to stay from this inhuman process, only going for signature or so.

Last February when my wife, Suneeta, renewed her passport, it was a very different experience. This time around, she filled her application online at government of India passport site(www.passportindia.gov.in/AppOnlineProject/welcomeLink ), sitting at home, on a Sunday evening. She then booked the meeting on-line, for which she had many options to choose from. Then she up-loaded digital images of required document proofs. Turns out, she needed only two. All said and done in 30 minutes. On the Tuesday of the interview, Suneeta went through normal token-based queue with five or so different processing units, taking about 55-60 minutes. No crowd, only short queues, decent furniture, air conditioned offices and polite crew. At the end of which she got all okayed to pay, meaning renewal approved. Same week, Friday morning Suneeta received SMS mentioning that her new passport was dispatched earlier evening. In the afternoon, courier delivered her new passport to our home.

Ten years ago, when I returned to India, it was unimaginable to think that one could renew passport in 5 days as a normal service, by spending no more than 4 hours (travel time included), without an agent.

This...