Environment ministry to digitise its records

Grappling with shortage of space, the environment ministry is in the process of digitising thousands of its records to overcome the problem.

"A large quantity of records are being produced on a daily basis because of which we are facing space constraints. We face a lot of difficulty in preserving the documents and  retrieving them in times of need," a senior environment ministry official said.

Digitisation is being seen as a solution and the ministry has already invited tenders to implement the project.

The latter will involve scanning lakhs of pages into electronic format, the official said. At present, all sections of the ministry headquarters at Paryavaran Bhawan were full of records. A single wing of Vigyan Sadan at R K Puram has been converted into a record room for files of various divisions.

"Even then, files are piling up steadily in the ministry's office resulting in acute shortage of space," he said.

Once digitised, processed files can be easily accessed through a search keyword.