Arzoo and Estonia

Two critical issues continue to be absent from Pakistan’s list of priorities. A galloping population and a dysfunctional bureaucracy. Pakistan’s potential to become a modern progressive state sharply hinges on addressing these two issues. This article aims to address the possibility of using digital technology to re-engineer our obsolete and complex governance processes.

The life of an ordinary citizen is inundated with laborious processes, meaningless documents and demeaning visits to government offices. Imagine the agony a widow of a retired government employee must undergo to receive pension after her husband’s death. She must put together a multitude of 18 fastidious documents, affidavits, photocopies, photographs, proof of marriage, proof the husband was actually dead and the wife alive. All this could be avoided if the information of family records was digitally, readily and securely available to the concerned departments.

Just look at Estonia, a very small country that is considered as the world’s most-advanced digital society today. It’s the only country where 99% of the public services are available online 24/7; where a citizen is not required to give any data to any government department if it has already been given once to a single department; and where a citizen is never required to visit a government office except when getting married or registering a real estate transaction.

While everyone knows about Skype, not many know it was developed by Estonian engineers and later sold to Microsoft for $8.56 billion in cash. The Estonian movement for a digital society is based on three factors — a forward-thinking government, a pro-active IT sector, and a tech-savvy population. About 98% of companies are established online, 99% of banking transactions are online and 98% of tax declarations are filed online. It takes only three minutes to file a tax return in Estonia.

In 2005, Estonia became the first nation to offer internet voting in a nationwide election. The groundbreaking i-vote system allows citizens to cast their votes from any internet-connected computer anywhere in the world. Unlike the costly electronic voting systems with problematic machinery used in some countries, the Estonian solution is simple and secure.

Another remarkable digital development Pakistan urgently needs to emulate is the Estonian Court Information System. The system is linked to information systems of police, jails, prosecutors and criminal case management. In many cases, the paper file is not formed at all. Every party can start a case and access or send documents online. The workflow engine delivers the necessary data to the portal of the allocated judge. Unlike Pakistan, an Estonian judge will not take weeks, form committees or ask for investigations to determine the age of a child. He is not dependent on shady affidavits by unethical lawyers or fraudulent ‘nikahnamas’ of fake ‘molvis’.  Within seconds he will receive the factual information from various government departments on his computer and decide the case in a matter of minutes.

Pakistan could have prevented the anguish, abuse and rape of the 13-year-old girl, Arzoo, in a recent case that involved kidnapping, forced marriage and change of religion. An efficient digital judicial information system is needed in Pakistan to bypass the antiquated and superfluous dependence on affidavits, stamp papers, lawyers and notary publics. Any information needed by courts on facts and data ought to be provided instantaneously by the government’s network of databases. Had it not been for a massive media outburst and the brave lawyer, Jibran Nasir, Arzoo would spend the rest of her life in circumstances of unspeakable abuse and misery.