News Registration Goes Online; Application Processing Time Cut Down from Months to 7 Days

The process to move newspaper registration with RNI online has already begun and is anticipated to be finished by March 31 of the following year

on Dec 28, 2022

According to a senior official in the information and broadcasting ministry on Tuesday, the process of registering newspaper publications with the Registrar of Newspapers in India (RNI) will soon be entirely digital, cutting the processing time for applications from several months to just seven days.

The process to move newspaper registration with RNI online has already begun and is anticipated to be finished by March 31 of the following year: The effort is reportedly being worked on as part of the state's Digital India and ease of doing business initiatives by the information and broadcasting ministry, the nodal department in charge of the exercise.

The I&B ministry conducted a space analysis of its premises and freed up approximately 11.5 lakh square feet across 20 locations as part of a separate effort to declutter and modernize its offices.

The extra space, which is mostly in a desirable location, will not only be used to house related government agencies that presently operate outside of government-owned buildings, but it will also generate more money through rental income.

Anurag Thakur, the minister of information and broadcasting, said that the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan's space audit and effective building management also generated profits of nearly 22 crore rupees.

On September 29, when Thakur visited the Doordarshan Kendra in Ahmedabad, the space audit was launched. On Monday, the drill in Bhopal came to an end.

The I&B ministry reported that the space optimization program freed up roughly 90,000 square feet of space in Mumbai alone, which Thakur stated can profit the Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kurnool, Chennai, Thrissur, Thiruvananthapuram, Jabalpur, Chandigarh, Lucknow, Coimbatore, Panaji, Amritsar, Sambalpur, Bhawanipatna, Puducherry, Mangaluru, Berhampur, and Bhopal are just a few of the cities where the I&B ministry owns buildings and spaces.

According to Thakur, the ministry now intends to co-locate its different offices in the area freed up during the audit to promote stronger cooperation among sister organizations and efficient distribution through integrated promotional programs.

The space audit conducted by the government was also referenced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his "Mann ki Baat" speech on December 25.