Cloud Computing and E-Governance: Advances, Opportunities and Challenges

Cloud computing provides a new service consumption and delivery model inspired by Consumer Internet Services. Cloud computing drives down costs and accelerates cost reduction benefit. Cloud is making rapid inroads in several sectors and e-Governance is the latest in this direction. e-Governance with cloud computing offers integration management with automated problem resolution, manages security end to end, and helps budget based on actual usage of data. At a global level, Cloud architectures can benefit government to reduce duplicate efforts and increase effective utilization of resources, helping the government go green and reducing pollution and effective waste management. In this paper, the authors describe how this newly emerged paradigm of cloud computing can be helpful for e-Governance. It also describes the role of cloud computing standards and architectures in framing a good e-Governance strategy to realize e-Government. Governments have been slower in realizing the potential benefits of the Information Technology to provide e-services. E-services are delivering cost-effective services, which can drive the growth of the economy and government productivity. DOI: 10.4018/ijcac.2012100103 International Journal of Cloud Applications and Computing, 2(4), 32-52, October-December 2012 33 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. viding transparency, effective working, instant response and availability of information of Government machinery to end users, time to time (GoI, 2011). The existing e-Governance is very much server centric, cost effective in nature and finds itself unable to address all categories of users starting from rural urban to metropolitan citizens (Sasikala, 2011b). The success of e-Governance lies on wiping out of this discrimination by providing accessibility of different web services of e-Governance irrespective of geographical and language barriers. Accessing the different web services of e-Government by using sophisticated laptop or desktop are beyond the reach for a large number of users even in developing countries like India. In India, 70% of the total population earn less than Rs 80 per day and cannot afford expensive laptop or desktop etc to get the facilities of eGovernance. Hence e-Governance facilities are confined within limited inhabitants and remain unsuccessful. Governments around the world are actively looking into cloud computing as a means of increasing efficiency and reducing cost. In continuation of our work on cloud computing (Sasikala, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c, 2011d) we present in this paper the realities and the possibilities of the role, cloud computing can impart in the e-Governance process.