In big swadeshi push, Sridhar Vembu’s Zoho to power govt’s email service
New Delhi: Zoho has been chosen to run the government’s email service after receiving approval to power the National Informatics Centre email system for the Indian government, founder Sridhar Vembu revealed.
“It was announced a while ago. And it has been steadily building up. All of the users are coming on board. About more than 1.5 million users are on board now. And we went through at least about 15, maybe 20 audits of covering all of the areas of our code, our data center, our security practices, all of it. Extensive number of audits we have gone through. And only after that, the NIC team selected Zoho,” he told told Moneycontrol.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) floated the tender in 2023.
Zoho bagged the task, which involves migration from the National Informatics Centre’s email solution, where nearly 33 lakh government employees are registered, to a secure cloud service.
Zoho has been in the news after top government officials endorsed its social media app Arattai, a made-in-India WhatsApp alternative.
It witnessed a jump in demand as sign-ups increased from around 3,000 to over 350,000 in just three days last month.
Union Ministers and government departments have started using the Zoho Office suite and email service amid a push for ‘swadeshi’ products.
“Hello, everyone. I have switched to Zoho Mail. Kindly note the change in my email address. My new email address is amitshah.bjp@zohomail.in. For future correspondence via mail, kindly use this address. Thank you for your kind attention to this matter,” Home Minister Amit Shah posted on X last week.
Zoho mail is ad-free and secure and is part of larger Zoho Workplace suite.
The suite also includes tools for office communication, productivity, and collaboration.
The officials of the Ministry of Education are also using Zoho Office Suite for official work, fostering a push towards self-reliance and cutting down dependency on foreign software, according to officials.
“By embracing Zoho’s indigenous office tools, we empower India to lead with homegrown innovation, strengthen digital sovereignty, and secure our data for a self-reliant future,” the ministry said in a circular.
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