GIS’s innovativeness in bringing the citizens closer to Government Lalan Kumar Scientist Central Mining Research Institute, India Email: lalan_seminar@yahoo.co.in Vijay K Kalyani Assistant Director Central Mining Research Institute, Dhanbad Email: vkkalyani@yahoo.com R Lolarak Scientist & Head Central Mining Research Institute, Dhanbad Email: rlolarak@yahoo.com Geographical Information System (GIS) was introduced in India in the late 80’s. It is now being used as a mapping and analytical tool in different disciplines. One of the greatest challenges facing Local Government in the 21st century is keeping up with the demands of the citizens. This means local councils taking on efficient management of resources, planning and taking responsible decisions, and, above all, keeping the public up to date on information and opening the way to their participation. Until recently, for most Spanish local governments, cartography and geographical information systems seemed to have little to do with these issues. The question in political and managerial circles was always the same: why invest a good deal of money in cartography if in the end it will only be used by a handful of specialists, and so would affect neither the bulk of internal management nor relations with the general public. The failure of some emblematic projects helped to further marginalize cartography and GIS, pushing them to the edge of investments in the modernisation of local governments. As a contrast to this biased view of cartography and GIS tools, are initiatives such as the corporative GIS set up a couple of years ago by the some council at abroad. The GIS system there is intended to become a true catalyst for a modern and efficient organization that is close to the public. In the following lines we investigate the inherent difficulties of a project with these characteristics, the results of the same and the future challenges that India will have to face to keep the public informed and encourage them to participate in local management. Govt. of India has already emphasized in this area by establishing Information Felicitation Centre in each and every ministry for providing information to the citizen but still we are unable to provide GIS based information on those centres. Such centres should be available at least in each and every block headquarters for the citizen, which will bring them closer to the government. Such strategic commitments must be adopted by India in this regard at the earliest; that is to say put cartography to the forefront of local management. In theory this seemed straightforward; to design and implement a transverse information system that would allow the maintenance and use of cartography, and which would integrate progressively with the different processes and information flows from the different functional areas of the municipal council and rural/urban development departments. The limits set by the original goals and the magnitude of the project that was to be undertaken required clear strategic reference points. It was necessary to break with the past and invest efforts into an open and scaleable GIS model, which would be different from the previous one in three key aspects; the quality of the information, a unified cartographic database and a server with scaleable and configurable maps. The commitment to quality cartography: The principal asset of a GIS is cartography. This cartography only constitutes an added value to municipal management and decision-making if it is of good quality and is properly kept through a strict and continuous updating system. The dispersion and variety (in scale, format, etc.) of the existing cartographic sources available in India before the start of the project, as well as the inadequate state of conservation of the same, made their use as a cartographic base for the new GIS both expensive and uncertain as to the results. The greatest challenge facing local government is to convert its internet portal into a forum for facilitating communication between government and the public. We have already a cartographic portal which provides access to information on public transport, equipment and tourist information (hotels, restaurants). Still, I have to go further by providing dynamic links between the portal and the maps managed by the different organizations. This will significantly increase the usefulness of the portal for the public, who will be able to request planning certificates through the internet; report incidents detected on the street; track applications; identify and download the maps most suited to a particular engineering project using a metadata search engine; find the best route to go to the conference hall from the hotel, etc. Cartography will also encourage greater participation of the public in defining municipal policies and the decision making process.