Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar launches new automation software ARPAN 3.0 for Indian Army

NEW DELHI: Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar today launched a new automataion software, ARPAN 3.0 for the over 12 lakh soldiers of the Indian Army which would provide them easy access to their service records including pay and leave details and transfer and postings among others.

The roll out of ARPAN 3.0 (Army Record Office Process Automation 3.0), which coincides with the National Digital India week, launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday, is aimed at digitisation of Indian Army's 45 Record Offices pan India in one year time.

It has already been test-bedded at seven ROs and now it would be implemented in five more while all 45 ROs are to be digitised in one year time in a phased manner.

The service records of all the officers of the Army have already been digitised.

"I hope in a year time we will be perfectly on the website," Parrikar said at the launch which was attended by Army Chief Gen Dalbir Singh Suhag and senior defence Ministry and Army officials.

With this software, soldiers, including junior commissioned officers, can access service records at the unit level itself through Army's intra-net facility, using an assigned login ID and password.

"The launch of ARPAN 3.0 not only digitised the 45 ROs but would also seamlessly integrate it with the human resources management system (HRM 2.0)," Gen Suhag said.

The new software is user friendly and can be accessed both by the units as well as individual, he said.

ARPAN 3.0 has been developed jointly by the Army Software Development Centre (ASDC) and Tech Mahindra, using state-of-the-art web-based technology.

The Army has invested Rs 1.9 crore in developing ARPAN 3.0 with the Tech Mahindra, which got the contract after a competitive bidding process, sources said.

As of now, all these records are maintained manually, which is a time-consuming exercise and the implementation of the new automation software would cut down the time significantly.