Union Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs L. Murugan, inaugurating the National e-Vidhan Application (NEVA) in Puducherry Legislative Assembly, in Puducherry on June 9, 2025. Lt. Governor K. Kailashnathan, Chief Minister N. Rangasamy, Speaker R. Selvam, and Chief Secretary Sharat Chauhan, are also seen in the picture
| Photo Credit: S.S. Kumar
Puducherry Legislative Assembly has joined the select group of States and Union Territories in India to implement the Centre’s National e-Vidhan Application (NeVA), a programme to digitise Assembly proceedings.
Union Minister of State for Information, Broadcasting and Parliamentary Affairs L. Murugan, on Monday (June 9, 2025), inaugurated NeVA application for the Puducherry Assembly at a function held in a private hotel here. The inaugural event was attended by Lieutenant Governor K. Kailashnathan, Chief Minister N. Rangasamy, Speaker R. Selvam, Ministers, Legislators and senior officials from the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and UT.
Implemented at a cost of ₹8.5 crore, NeVA would enable the Puducherry Assembly to conduct the proceedings of the next session in a digitised format. The legislators would be able to read the customary address of the Lt. Governor, Chief Minister’s budget speech, list of business, notices served by the members, raise questions and replies of Ministers on the tablet installed on the tables of MLAs in the House.
The system is integrated in such a way that Secretaries and Department heads could assist Ministers by providing real -time inputs while MLAs raise supplementary questions. The legislators will have access to the House proceedings of other States and Union Territories in their regional language as NeVA has been conceived as a unified platform, embodying the vision of ‘One Nation- One Application’.
“The aim of the project is to ensure that the Legislative Business of the House is conducted in a paperless manner and to bring all the legislatures of the country together, in one platform, thereby creating a massive data depository without having the complexity of multiple applications,” a note issued by Press Information Bureau said.
Partnering with BHASHINI, Ministry of Electronics, and Information Technology, NeVA also integrates AI/ML based real-time translation services, boosting linguistic inclusivity. So far, 28 State Legislatures have signed MoU with the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs for NeVA implementation and 18 houses have already transformed into digital format for conducting the proceedings. The project would cost the Centre around ₹673 crore.
Mr. Murugan said the big digitisation process happening in the country was one of the components of making the country a developed nation by 2047.
“After Narendra Modi took over as the Prime Minister of the country in 2014, a big transformation is happening in the country. The Digital India mooted by the Prime Minister was part the transformation. People are getting money in their bank accounts under various welfare schemes by the click of a button,” he said.
The Lt. Governor suggested the government to make the Assembly proceedings live on television as the next big step.
Chief Minister N. Rangasamy urged the officials to make full utilisation of the project to strengthen the proceedings of the house.
Published – June 09, 2025 04:59 pm IST