Finance Dept clarifies on Finance software
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, April 23 2018:
Reacting to reports published in some sections of the media during the last three days about Finance software and its utilisation in the Finance Department, Under Secretary (to Government of Manipur) Aribam Amarjit Sharma has clarified that the software is fully operational.
The State Cabinet in its meeting held on 05-09-2015 approved for development of Finance Management Software and Engagement of Appoids Tech Solutions Private Limited for this purpose.
Since the Cabinet decided to engage the firm for development of the software, in the said meeting, calling of tender was not necessary, said the Under Secretary.
As per the OM of 2013, the high tender committee was headed by the Secretary of Finance Department with administrative department Secretary and Head of the Department as members.
Since, the firm is owned by the son of Dr J Suresh Babu, the committee was chaired by the then Chief Secretary PC Lawmkunga, not by Dr J Suresh Babu.
Further, the committee's mandate was only to finalise the financial bid.
The software proposed was an integrated one with about eight modules namely Budget module, Expenditure module, Resource module, Treasury module, Report module, Administrative departments module, File tracking module and Administration module.
The committee with representatives from Finance and IT departments, finalised the price based on the quantum of work involved.
The firm developed the software which was tested by a committee consisting of Finance and Information Technology Departments on 21-03-2016 and was launched at the same time after approval by the committee.
Since then the software has been working efficiently and the firm has also been maintaining it satisfactorily.
The budget for the year 2016-17 was prepared on this software.
However, the budget for 2017-18 was initially not prepared on this software, as the concept of budget has been changed by Government of India from Plan-Non Plan to Revenue and Capital model.
As the original software was developed on Plan-Non Plan concept, the software has been modified by the firm again free of cost in the month of March 2017 to Capital-Revenue concept.
The budget of 2017-18 was loaded on 31/03/2017 and became fully operational.
The budget for 2018-19 has been prepared on this software fully and it is operational, clarified the Under Secretary.
He added that if anyone needs further information, it can be obtained through proper channel.