The district of Jalgaon in Maharashtra won the award of excellence in the District category while Education Department, Madhya Pradesh and Finance Department, Gujarat received the award of excellence in the Department category. 23 eGovernance initiatives were awarded under various categories.

The CSI-Nihilent e-Governance Awards 2008-09 for e-governance initiatives during the period April 1 2008 to March 31 2009 were announced at a grand function held at the 44th Annual Convention of CSI at Pune. Held for the seventh successive year, the awards are an annual process of identifying and recognizing the best e-Governance initiatives in India in citizen services at the State, Department, District and Project level.

Speaking at the awards function, Piyush Gupta, Convener of the awards, said, "The aim of these awards is to recognize and replicate the successful initiatives in achieving good governance using ICT. We have continuously improved the evaluation process, making these awards the true benchmark for quality conception and implementation of e-governance initiatives."

Ravi Teja, Country Manager, India and Head, Enterprise Transformation Practice, Nihilent said, "e-Governance is a tool to ensure equitable and easy to avail good governance. The biggest challenge is change management encompassing cultural, organizational, process, people and technological challenges. A metrics driven governance would enable a government department or municipal corporation to perform its functions efficiently and effectively to achieve its public mission"

Madhya Pradesh was awarded for its initiatives such as computerization in government departments, manpower development for IT, guidelines for setting up of information kiosks and development of web sites by all government departments, facilitating good governance. MPOnline, a citizen services portal delivers a wide range of government services (copy of land records, forms for professional examination board, birth/death, caste certificates, etc.), improving transparency and accountability, and reducing delivery cycles.

The district administration of Jalgaon, Maharashtra received the award of excellence in the District category for developing an Integrated Voice Response System (E-Lokshahi) that provides 24 hour online public grievance redress system and FAQ forum being used widely through telephone and mobile.

The award of excellence in Department category was conferred on two departments - An e-Government initiative of the Education Department of Madhya Pradesh received the award for enhancing the quality of education to 1.60 crore students enrolled in 1.10 lakh schools by optimal utilization of the 3.5 Lac teachers and resources. The Finance Department of Madhya Pradesh was recognised for implementing e-governance best practices such as comprehensive dashboard with drill down facility, uniform decision support system reports for decision making, electronic payment to pensioners, online receipt of various taxes with real time accounting in state accounts.