Digital debacle

In 2012, the government took on a Tk 541 crore project to convert 8,500 post offices in rural areas to e-centres for the communities.

Six years after its completion, the project appears to have completely failed to achieve its objectives, according to a report of the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General of Bangladesh prepared by making in-person visits to 900 such centres over a five-and-a-half-month period.

The Post e-Centre for Rural Community project aimed to deliver services including internet, e-governance, e-commerce, e-education, e-agriculture, faster disbursement of remittances and allowances.

"All these services had been mentioned in the development project proposal [DPP] only to get the project approval. The overall analysis shows that government funds had been wasted ... ," said the CAG report.

No measures were taken to promote the services among the rural population; only photocopying and printing are done there.

Mustafa Jabbar, who has been serving as posts and telecom minister since December 2018, acknowledged the inadequate planning when the project was undertaken.

The initiatives that were taken before 2018 to establish digital post offices were without a proper plan, he told The Daily Star.

"So, we have set up a digital service design lab with the assistance of a2i and conducted a survey suggested by the lab. With the survey, we are trying to identify what type of services should the rural post offices offer."

A DPP is being prepared to digitalise the post offices, Jabbar added.

About Tk 380.68 crore was spent on purchasing desktops, laptops, photo printers, laser printers, scanners, modems, headphones, webcams, solar power systems, POS machines, finger vein machines, chairs and tables.

About 20 percent of the e-centres were never inaugurated, so the equipment there had never been used.

About Tk 18.83 crore was spent to purchase 8,450 computer tables, 8,450 computer chairs and 16,900 visitor chairs.

No furniture was found in 630 of the 900 centres visited by the CAG team.

"That means, 70 percent of furniture has been lost," the report said.

The CAG auditors also found Tk 7.81 crore was wasted by purchasing devices not required.

At almost every centre, the colour printers are falling apart due to lack of use as people are not aware of their availability at the e-centres.

Similarly, the 8,500 webcams were purchased even though the laptops have built-in webcams. Scanners were purchased separately when photo printers could do the job.

"The webcams and scanners are left unused."

Some 500 external hard drives were purchased although the hard drives in computers had enough storage.

And due to the purchase of low-quality laptops, one or two devices were found damaged in every centre. Solar panels were damaged within a year of installation, according to the report.

But no such service delivery was observed, according to the report.

A total of 8,500 Teletalk modems had been purchased for the e-centres to provide internet services to rural communities. But those modems remained unused.

The e-centres were supposed to be manned by individuals with the view to turning them into small entrepreneurs.

But those manning the e-centres were found unable to help rural people with services. They were also found to be involved in various other professions and are unable to give enough time to the e-centres.

The e-centres also failed to provide mobile banking and remittance services and safety net disbursement.

Under the project, 17,000 POS machines and 10,000 finger vein machines were purchased to provide more reliable and speedy disbursement of allowances under the social safety net.

Only one centre was found to be providing the allowance during the visit.

In its response, the audited organisation said no unnecessary devices were purchased and all devices that were purchased, following the approved DPP, are being used in the centres.

Besides, some of the e-centres could not be opened due to a lack of people to man them.

The CAG auditors did not accept the explanations.