New Delhi, July 17 (IANS) Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Sunday launched an e-portal for Lok Sabha members that will enable them to interact with each other and with various branches of the secretariat through e-mail and SMS, and is another step in making work of the Parliament's lower house paperless.
"In the cyber age, institutions including parliaments and legislatures are now gravitating towards setting up mechanisms for e-administration and functioning and laying stress on online correspondence," Mahajan said on the occasion.
"As a step up in this direction, we are launching e-portal of Lok Sabha Members, which would inter alia facilitate online submission of various notices by members," she added.
She said that by reducing the use of paper, the government is not only preserving the environment but also saving money.
"By reducing the use of papers we have saved about 1,000 trees. I am sure with your kind cooperation, we would be able to convert Lok Sabha into a paperless institution," she said.
"Our principal intent behind striving towards paperless office has been preservation of our environment. The reduction in use of paper has resulted in direct saving of approximately Rs 80 lakh per year," she added.
The Lok Sabha secretariat has already stopped printing and circulation of hard copies of Unstarred Questions and Bulletin Part-II.
The number of hard copies of Budget documents also has been reduced by 35 percent.
The portal launched has separate login and password for each member. After the launch,
members will be able to e-file questions and notices online.
The portal also provides ready information regarding Bills, Committee meeting schedules, Agenda and Reports, verbatim debates and other parliamentary information.
On the ocassion, Mahajan also released the seventh edition of the book "Practice and Procedure of Parliament" by M.N. Kaul and S.L. Shakdher.
