Sherab Lhamo

The government has so far spent Nu 7.936 million to develop 39 government apps under the Government-to-Citizen initiative, with annual maintenance costs amounting to Nu 1.132 million.

Responding to a Kuensel query during the meet-the-press session yesterday, the Prime Minister expressed concerns over the complexity and functionality of several of these applications, indicating that many may be redundant or challenging for users.

The government has also invested a total of Nu 6.6 million in developing three mobile applications including Druk Speed, mRSTA and Bhutan RoadWatch app.

The Bhutan InfoComm and Media Authority spent around Nu 1.8 million on the development and maintenance of the Druk Speed app.

The Bhutan Construction and Transport Authority spent Nu 4 million on the eRails system, which encompasses the mRSTA app with an additional Nu 1.8 million for the system’s maintenance. 

The Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport spent Nu 800,000 to develop the Bhutan RoadWatch App.

Collectively, these three applications have recorded 102,000 downloads on the Play Store.

However, some apps, such as Bhutan Weather and Druk Namshey from the National Centre for Hydrology and Meteorology, have overlapping functionalities but fail to provide timely weather updates. Others, like Druk Smart Parking and eKaasel, have recorded fewer than 100 downloads.

Apps like SanamJabchor, CityWorks and TTCMS by Thimphu thromde, Drukmed, myAcc, Access2Care Bhutan, Dairy Info, DPM & MDV, have recorded 10 to 500 downloads in the Play Store.

An official from Thimphu Thromde said that efforts are underway to enhance the TTpay app and other less popular applications. The official revealed that upgrading and enhancing these apps incurs a daily cost of Nu 5,000 when necessary.

The Prime Minister said that GovTech is currently evaluating strategies to reduce the number of government apps, consolidate similar functionalities, and improve overall user-friendliness.

Currently, the government operates 284 IT systems across various agencies and maintains 113 websites, a number deemed excessive by experts.

The Prime Minister underscored the importance of streamlining these systems and eliminating superfluous applications, ensuring that the remaining ones are fully functional and user-friendly.

A total of 127 cybersecurity incidents were reported in 2022-23, with numbers rising each year. Most incidents were linked to software vulnerabilities, fraud-related activities such as phishing and scams, ransomware attacks, and compromises of privileged accounts and applications.