India’s aviation industry has seen steep growth in the last few years and the graph is only going north. To tap into the deep potential of this sector, the Ministry of Civil Aviation in India has introduced a slew of liberal policies and established stringent security norms. Ensuring these play out on the ground exactly as they are intended to, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA)–India’s air safety regulator–decided to undertake pan-enterprise digital transformation.
The apex body’s core objective is to ensure safe and efficient air travel through a transparent regulatory framework and proactive safety oversight. This requires an elaborate, well-oiled machinery at the backend that enables seamless delivery of services to all the stakeholders, including pilots, aircraft engineers, operators, flying trainers, and so on.
The DGCA realized that to support the industry’s growth momentum, it had to transform into a fully modernized, digital organization. In keeping with this vision, the following key challenges needed to be addressed:
Realizing that these challenges were gradually denting its growth potential, DGCA chose to partner with TCS to digitally transform its operations. Longer processing times and nearly zero visibility into the status of open applications frustrated the end users and this is what DGCA set out to fix when it joined forces with TCS in 2019.
The DGCA wanted to create a digital ecosystem with nearly 300 services across multiple directorates, and the idea of eGCA took birth. TCS was tasked with the design, development, testing, implementation, and maintenance of this solution which would enhance efficiency by reducing the processing time of services and improve overall governance. This entailed reengineering the processes, eliminating procedural complexities, and carrying out hassle-free aviation-related activities through a single-window entity with minimal human interface and real-time tracking.
As part of its rapid transformation methodology, TCS conducted multiple workshops with different stakeholders in the customer organization to list all the processes, the activities under each, the as-is and to-be turnaround times, and so on. This approach also helped identify normal scenarios, exceptions, pain areas, and the level of integration between departments. Armed with these insights, our experts embarked on process reengineering using the TCS Machine First™ model.
TCS leveraged its DigiGOV platform to build a single-window platform for DGCA that would deliver symmetric experience and enable seamless data exchange, with minimal human intervention. TCS also developed Android and iPhone apps for the eGCA portal, equipped with a chatbot for addressing user queries, to provide anytime, anywhere assistance.
The safety of passengers and crew is of utmost importance to DGCA, and by association, for TCS. It is with this core objective that TCS teams worked tirelessly day in and day out, even during the difficult and uncertain couple of years during the COVID-19 pandemic, to build the eGCA portal, the backend framework, mobile apps, and IVR- and chatbot-based helpdesk.
The aviation regulator today enjoys seamless and timely service delivery across all departments, and robust decision-making backed by a data-driven rules engine. In addition to improving stakeholder experience, the integrated, smart, and digital ecosystem that DGCA has built has helped the regulator strengthen governance and tighten policy enforcement.
The single window portal has made the requisition and issuance of pilot licenses far easier than what it was during the ‘paper era’. The process now is highly responsive, transparent, and a lot less complicated, much to the delight of all the stakeholders.
"Based on the Prime minister's vision for an Atma Nirbhar Bharat, I'm confident that the unveiling of this eGCA initiative will go along way in insuring both ease of doing business in India as well as making ourselves much more focused on an eGovernance model. Our insistence and our steadfast resolve in making sure regulatory processes are much more efficient, much more customer driven are now propounded in our eGCA initiative. I would like to congratulate all the stakeholders eGCA in particular and also all the stakeholders that have come together to make this venture possible. It is our resolve to be customer facing, it is our resolve to be customer centric., it is our resolve to be in the service of all our stakeholders. I'm confident that this eGCA initiative will go along way inservicing all our customers in the years to come. I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate TCS and innovative IT solution provide in assisting us, in making sure that we achieve this goal of customer centric delivery. Congratulations to the full team and I hope that all our stakeholders are satisfied with the new service delivery mechanism that, eGCA is going to perform."
"The eGovernance project launched by DGCA in consultation with TCS, at the initiative of our honorable Prime Minister is a great project to digitally access DGCA and its services. It will bring greater ease of doing business within DGCA. It will make the lives and the tasks of the stakeholders that much better, and it will ensure that the productivity increases. I wish the DGCA and the TCS the very best and hope that all the stakeholders will enjoy this digital experience."
“The eGCA project aims to enable digital interactions between DGCA and its stakeholders for all its processes and functions. The digital platform would add value to the safety regulatory functions of DGCA and it would also ensure seamless communication with its stakeholders.”
“I congratulate while DGCA team, as well as TCS team for their extraordinary efforts and hard work for the successful completion of the eGCA project.”