The Center for Excellence in Postal Technology (CEPT), functioning from the serene Campus of Postal Training Centre, Mysore has come of age. It is the testimony of Department’s endeavor of leveraging technology to achieve excellence in Postal Services in the form of a Technology Center.
To put things in perspective, what CEPT today is nothing but realization of a dream of a team of enthusiastic and committed officials of the Department who believed that induction of technology can enable the 150 year old Post Office to change its profile to meet the challenges of the changing environment.
Technology has always dictated and lead the change in the way things are done or need to be done. The Department of Posts is not an exception. The journey of CEPT began when “Meghdoot” was born at the Software Development Centre of PTC, Mysore. Today Meghdoot software is one of the most precious technology tool offered by CEPT to the Post Offices across the country. Meghdoot is perhaps an unparallel and un-precedented example of successful IT intervention and Technology Management by a Government Department for improving its services. The success of this technology endeavor was purely based on the fact that Meghdoot was our own product developed by our own personnel. This facilitated acceptance and internalization of the software by the entire Postal operation system easily. Hence, what began as a small initiative way back in 1996-98 necessitated a need to have a full fledged Center for Excellence in Postal Technology very aptly located and inaugurated in 2009 in the same campus where Meghdoot was born.
Globally, Information Technology is the backbone of Commerce, Industry and Public Service Delivery Systems. CEPT also transformed into a Technology Hub over a short period of time. It became a unique example of realizing the latent potentials in the human resource. Willing officials from the cadre of Postal Assistants, Inspectors and Assistant Superintendents with IT skills coming from various circles have made in-house contribution to the technology initiatives of the Department.The group is constantly engaged in development and maintenance of IT tools such as Meghdoot, SpeedNet, e-Payment and many more. Needless to say, the asset value of CEPT Mysore purely in terms of software development and support is immense.
Today, CEPT provides active support to the Department in offering the products riding on technology backbone. It provides support to about 25,000 Post offices across the country using various software applications.
During the year 2008, the need for storing information at a Central location also became essential. Hence, a Data Center was established at the software development center at CEPT, acting as a repository of all the vital transactional data emanating from the Post offices across the Country.
CEPT also played a very crucial role in the Department’s most coveted ‘Project Arrow’ which later won the Prime Minister’s >Excellence award 2008-09. Starting with collecting critical real transactional data for the 50 Project Arrow Post offices of Phase I, today CEPT picks up real transactional data from about 15,584 Post offices, processes it and supplies to the Project Arrow office. The monitoring based on micro information of each Project Arrow Post office helped in improving quality of services. The Centre has also assumed greater role in the “Mail Network Optimistion Project”
Technology initiative is never static. CEPT also had to keep pace by upgrading the existing products or introducing new products. This has been taken care of by periodical release of updates and process upgrades for products and services by the department. Not only this, in view of the massive IT modernization project currently undertaken by the Department, the CEPT is well aware of its future role and responsibility. Whereas, the potential of technology interventions and IT tools are unlimited and ever evolving, the main challenge comes in Technology Management which calls for a co-ordinated effort by one and all in the Department. The CEPT in the years to come will continue to play a significant role and have a greater responsibility in Department of Post’s endeavor to transform the Post a truly IT enabled and Citizen centric and act as a single window resource center for all IT related activities.
