The Covid-19 crisis and digital speed – Burning Issues

The Covid-19 pandemic gives us a chance to reevaluate the worth of two major initiatives of the government:
demonetization and digitization.
Today, most bill payments have moved online and barring older people, who may prefer to pay their electricity bills at physical counters, digitization is delivering in spades.
But digitization is not just about payments and financial transactions. Consider what all will happen as the current lockdown persists across the country.

Judiciary

Courts are beginning to use video-conferencing to conduct hearings
When the entire case is recorded, the possibility of judges conducting trials in an unfair way gets substantially reduced
At some point, a judicial appointments commission will have video records of all judges shortlisted for promotions.

Healthcare sector

Remote patient examinations, analysis of symptoms with the help of databases and algorithms, and even the basic task of taking down a new patient’s medical history can all be done remotely through a digital app or interface.
India may be spending too much on training doctors at a cost of millions of rupees per head when a lot of that money could have been spent on technology to deliver competent and lower-cost healthcare.

We should recognize the importance of going digital.
It should make us think of how to convert the Covid-19 disruption into an agenda that brings us up to technological speed in various spheres of human activity.