Kathmandu, November 13

The government has issued the ‘Directives on Management of Email in Government Agencies’ to exchange or share letters, information, documents, decisions and other details among them through email.

The directives commenced upon publication in the Nepal Gazette yesterday. It aims at easing  service delivery and prompt decision-making, maintaining records of government business  and achieving the goal of paperless system in government offices. As per the directives, employees working in government agencies shall use an integrated email system.

“However, if any government agency requires separate email system to provide any particular service or the one pertaining to national security issues, it may operate such system on the recommendation of an eight-member coordination committee led by secretary at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology,” the directives state.

No one shall be permitted to operate and establish the server and data of IES outside Nepal. The IES shall have Two Factor Authentication (2FA), an extra layer of protection used to ensure security of online accounts beyond just a username and password to protect against remote attacks such as phishing.

The responsibility of developing, operating and repairing/maintaining the IES shall rest with the National Information Technology Centre. The IES has the domain name of mail.nepal.gov.np. The personal email account of civil servants shall be maintained as @nepal.gov.np after his/her name and surname. “In case of one or more employees with the same name and surname, numeral(s) like 1, 2 etc. shall be inserted,” the directives state.

While appointing an employee, it requires the concerned government office to mention his/her email account in the letter of appointment. The email account shall be used to exchange or share letters, information, decisions, documents and other details between or among government agencies, seek or share opinion, write notes and orders, and share information with service-seekers. According to the directives, the government agencies should use digital signature to carry out these functions.

The directives prohibit any government employ from using the IES to send lewd and gender violence related materials, threaten or defame any person or organisation, disseminate confidential information, share unauthorised software programmes, and serve private purpose. The emails sent or received via the IES should be archived for at least five years. The Department of Information Technology shall carry out security audit of the IES and server and infrastructures relating thereto on an annual basis.