The President of India, Ram Nath Kovind today awarded Mr. Ravi Bhagat, IAS for his commendable services rendered in capacity as District Electoral Officer, Ludhiana. The award was conferred to the Mr. Ravi Bhagat in a splendid function organized at the Manek Shaw stadium, New Delhi. The Function was organized to celebrate the National Voters’ Day.Disclosing this official spokesperson of the Chief Electoral Officer, Punjab said that Mr. Ravi Bhagat was awarded for his innovative initiatives for Election Management in the field of Information Technology. Mr. Bhagat is currently posted asChief Administrator, Punjab Urban Planning & Development Authority (PUDA) .Divulging further the spokesperson said that Mr. Bhagat had developed two path breaking software applications, RoNet and ECI360, during the Elections to simplify the monitoring by RO's and increase awareness of the voters. The prestigious award is conferred upon by the Election Commission of India and the winners are selected from contenders from among the states and Officers at National level who contribute to the conduct of Best Electoral Practices. Mr. Bhagat has a number of awards and recognitions to his name. While serving as the Deputy Commissioner, Amritsar, he was conferred upon the Census Silver Medal by the Hon' President of India in recognition of outstanding zeal and high quality of service rendered during the Census of India 2011. In 2014, the Election Commission of India presented him the State Level Best DEO Award for Best Electoral Practice in recognition of work undertaken by him in the capacity of Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Electoral Officer, Amritsar. He also has to his name, the Guinnes Book of World Records certificate for creating awareness regarding drug de-addiction in Amritsar. Always inclined towards improving the public service delivery through the use of technology, during his stint as Deputy Commissioner, Ludhiana, he got developed a mobile application named "i-revenue " that provides all district revenue related information on one platform and even calculates stamp duty rates. This effort of his was honored with Certificate of Recognition issued at The Manthan Award conducted by Digital Empowerment Foundation, which is a prestigious award of South East Asian countries. All the SAARC Nations contest for this award. In January 2017 at Ludhiana, he got organized an event in collaboration with Initiators of Change organization, wherein a record number of 6150 Voter card holders displayed Voter Card together and clicked largest number of selfies with voter cards. A national record certificate for this was issued to Mr. Bhagat by India Book of Records. Under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, in 2017, he was awarded by certificate of appreciation by the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Government of India for making Ludhiana open defecation
free (ODF). As the Deputy Commissioner of Faridkot, Mr. Bhagat was awarded with the Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) award by Election Commission of India. SVEEP is a programme of multiple interventions through different modes and designed to educate
citizens, electors and voters about the electoral process in order to increase their awareness and participation in the electoral processes. In 2015, in recognition of various services rendered by him, Tilla Baba Farid Religious & Charitable Society (Regd.), Faridkot honoured him with Baba Farid Award for Honesty. In his career, Mr. Bhagat has taken up several technology initiatives to provide better governance. To his credit are the mobile apps i-revenue, i-rakt, i-dto, i-sehat, Mum2be, Date2Vaccinate, Food2Share, eci360 (further contains 6 apps and 1 web portal), Mcl, Vote app, i-edu
feebank, E clu, mpuda, puda-ucic besides web portals i revenue courts and Returning officer network. He continues to work with utmost zeal and commitment to increase transparency and efficiency in public services, wherever he is posted in his official capacity.