E-Sewa Goes Digital: Councillors Now Empowered to Fast-Track Citizen Service Verifications Online

Key highlights

 

Ludhiana Municipal Corporation has made a big leap towards improving delivery of civic services by launching an online process for authentication of citizen service applications through the E-Sewa portal. The Councillors will now have a key role in digitally verifying requests for issuance of routine certificates, enabling public administration to be more accessible, transparent, and efficient.

 

How the New System Works

 

Regular citizen applications—like residence, caste (SC, BC/OBC), income, EWS, and old age pension certificates—are now filed and processed completely online.

 

After the application is submitted, the concerned patwari (revenue officer) sends it to the respective municipal councillor, who cross-checks the applicant's information directly from their E-Sewa dashboard or through a special WhatsApp chatbot.

 

This digital pipeline eliminates the need for applicants to visit multiple offices for signatures or verifications, drastically reducing turnaround time and curbing opportunities for malpractice or document misplacement.

 

The E-Sewa portal accommodates requests from all urban residents, while backend integration with patwaris guarantees applicants' documents are appropriately directed to their local councillor according to ward residence.

 

Training and Rollout

 

Municipal Corporation, with the assistance of district administration, conducted focused training programs for councillors to acquaint them with the E-Sewa verification mechanism and underlying technology tools.

 

Senior officials such as the Zonal Commissioner and the Mayor personally monitored the training program, which resulted in high take-up and resolution of operational queries on the spot.

 

A technical team, comprising district IT coordinators and network engineers, offered hands-on demonstrations and put in place a support system for ongoing troubleshooting.

 

Impact and Next Steps

 

This digital transformation is set to greatly optimize the workflow of more than 400 civic services on E-Sewa, providing quicker, more transparent governance and enhancing user experience for citizens. Going forward, the administration will be tracking the effectiveness of the new system, gaining feedback from applicants and councillors, and implementing additional enhancements to optimize transparency and reduce delays in service delivery.

 

Sources: The Tribune, eSewa Punjab, Punjab State Portal