Chapter 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Introduction In this chapter, the researcher explains the research process executed during the research on citizen adoption towards eGovernance services. The researcher had outlined the research strategy, research methods, developed instruments for collecting the data and data analysis. The Researcher has also mentioned the limitations of the research.

3.2 Problem Definition Worldwide nations are executing appreciable efforts and spending substantial funds for making eGovernance successful. Various schemes and programs are initiated and implemented from time to time. Specifically, in the case of Indian environment since last decade many citizen centric services like online Birth certificate, Caste certificate, Land Records and passport services are being offered through implementation of eGovernance. Digital India flagship program was given a new path to Indian eGovernance and further enhanced in the form of eKranti. eKranti offers eservices to the citizen of India. The Indian eGovernance is also looking forward towards citizen participation and the main objective of Digital India is to transform Governance to transformational Governance and not just transactional. The three visionary areas have been defined under Digital India as: • Digital Infrastructure as core utility to every citizen • Governance and services on demand • Digital empowerment to citizens

The government is making efforts to fulfil these visionary areas by establishing the required infrastructure and by providing various citizen centric services. Various early harvest programs were also announced. ‘mgov.in’ is an attempt for participatory government. But it is an elementary level step towards citizen participation in eGovernance. To know the eReadiness of any country, there is a necessity to understand the circumstances in terms of population and literacy and cultural background of the country.

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India is a country with a multilingual, multicultural society. It is the 7 th largest country with an area of around 3,287,263 Square kilometres.(1) India is having the world’s second largest population of 121.01crores (2011Census). (8) There are 22 different languages that have been recognized by the Constitution of India and uses English for official purposes. The literacy rate in the Country stands at 74.04%, 82.14% for male and 65.46% for female. Nearly 67% population of India lives in rural areas and 33% of the population lives in urban areas. (1) According to the Modified Mixed Reference Period (MMRP) concept proposed by the World Bank in 2015, India's poverty rate for period 2011-12 stood at 12.4% of the total population. India has a significant problem of poverty, despite being one of the fastest-growing economies in the world. According to the World Bank revised methodology, India has the third highest number of people living in extreme poverty after Nigeria and Congo (status as on January 2019). (7) Indian living conditions resemble the two sides of the coin. On the one side, some percentage of the population are rich and having all the resources, highly educated and on the other side, people who are very poor and not having any resources. Infrastructure facilities were not established in full-fledged manner. Digital divide, cultural divide exists in the country.

Given the above background, following were the concerns: Are targeted citizens getting all the benefits of the eGovernance services? Are the efforts of the eGovernance services spreading till the last mile? Even though some services are available in the form of mobile governance, is all the citizens are able to afford and to adopt eservices provided by the Government? Will they able to participate in the digital governance? Is all the category of the citizen are willingly adopting eGovernance? Are the citizens aware of these services and its usefulness? Before talking about the adoption of eGovernance, Will all the areas of the society be aware of eGovernance services? There is a gap between the demand and supply side of eGovernance. What is the root cause for the gap between serving and consuming and how it can be filled?

100 How to improve this adoption levels in the citizen for smooth and successful eGovernance implementation which will give a good return to the government efforts?

After observing the above-mentioned points, it is imperative to research citizen adoption towards these eGovernance services and find the root cause and solution for this problem.

3.3 Importance of this study In the previous chapter, the literature review was done on eGovernance, citizen perceptions, adoptions and the importance of timely and continuous assessment of eGovernance services. The Study was also conducted on various policies and standards that were in place. The entire literature review was done by categorizing the topics into People, Process and Policies. During the initial sections, various technology acceptance models, their implementations in eGovernance were discussed. The next sections were dealt with various frameworks to assess the processes and their importance. Out of previous experiences and through the literature study, the researcher was found many factors to assess the adoption levels. There were various studies about assessing and impact of eGovernance. But only few studies were existing on citizen adoption of eGovernance. Several studies made by various researchers on technology adoption and some researchers have implemented those models in their studies on internet adoption, internet shopping adoption and also in eGovernance services adoptions. But these researches had limited scope and confined to some services. Comparatively less research happened in countries with multicultural, multilingual and multi climatic conditions like India.

Secondly, very little research happened from the consumer side. For increasing citizen adoption towards eGovernance services, it is not enough to find the mechanisms to increase the citizen’s adoption levels. For increase in the adoption, balancing efforts are needed on both provider and consumer side. Only service quality or perceived usefulness will not give 100% results.

Even though technology can be the backbone in eGovernance implementation, but we can’t ignore the management side of technology and service delivery to the citizens as

101 in this scenario, the main stakeholder is the citizen. As citizen is a consumer of eservices provided by the government, it will resemble the model of customer and the company scenario. It is very much essential to treat a citizen who is a consumer of service as a customer of product. There are lot of resemblances in both the scenarios.

In market research, it is very important to examine ground level realities before launching any new product and also it is very much necessary to assess and improve the product to sustain the market for that product for a long time. Various researches will be conducted in case of market research for all and almost all products to understand the insights of customer responsiveness and loyalty and to improve the market scope. One major difference in both these scenarios is the outcome (Success/failure) of the service. For the Market, money is the main term to success, but in eGovernance, the Government measures the outcome in terms of citizen satisfaction and thereby eDemocracy but profit will not be in terms of the money. Provision and consumption of eservices is not the only goal of the Government especially under Digital India, but the main objective is knowledge economy and eservice to all. So, it is more important to know the citizen adoption and thereby increase the adoption by framing some methods. Much of the research need to be conducted in the area of understanding the ground realities of eGovernance and the measures to increase the adoption levels of the same.

3.4 Objectives 1. To identify and study various factors for citizen adoption towards eGovernance services. There are various factors that will affect the citizen adoption towards eGovernance services. Previous works of literature were showing a path to improve citizen adoption in multiple ways. Theories like Diffusion innovation and models like TAM, UTAUT were defined many factors to diffuse the innovation and acceptance of new technology in the society. Some pieces of literature were emphasized on the service quality and assessment of services.

The Researcher had an opinion that balancing efforts are needed from both provider and consumer side for increasing adoption in the citizens and it is not enough if some assessment mechanisms were identified to increase the service

102 quality or service availability. Only service quality or perceived usefulness will not give 100% results. There are many more factors required for successful adoption.

There is a necessity to formulate a concept for successful eGovernance adoption by citizen.

2. To analyse and propose the concept to escalate the citizen adoption towards existing citizen centric applications. The Researcher identified some of the implemented eGovernance services, five each from both Educational and Health eGovernance services. An Instrument in the form of a questionnaire was prepared based on the proposed 4A concept which is identified by qualitative research. The instrument was divided into three sections. Section A contains demographic information and the awareness and availability of mobiles and computers. Section B contains the awareness and experiences of the user on the identified services. Section C was the opinion of the factor framed by the researcher. Quantitative analysis was done and analysed the developed concept.

3. To study and prepare a model for mobile based portal which will be a single container for getting information and service for all eGovernance services. There is a necessity to study and frame a single portal where all the information about the eGovernance services irrespective of the state and central should be available. The system should be a content management system where various stakeholders should able to post information regarding new services and also their experiences. There should be some mechanism to administrate these postings. If there is a problem of the wrong data entry, the user should be able to consult somebody and get a solution or at least the way to get the solution. There is a necessity to study and frame a content management portal where the citizen can view all eGovernance services information, help manuals, information of training, FAQs, help desk information, videos to use the services, and also to post and get queries. The pros and cons of the system need to be studied and presented.

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4. To suggest a tool for spreading awareness on government schemes, facilities, and eGovernance services in the Health sector. The Government is announcing many schemes and giving various facilities to the citizen. Government is also providing various services electronically. But the common citizen does not aware and can’t able to utilize the schemes even in urban areas. In this scenario, there is a need to design a tool which will display all the required government schemes and it needs to be installed at various common places in the cities, villages so that citizen can interact and get the information from that tool. So, it is needed to study and suggest a model for spreading awareness of the available schemes and eHealth services.

3.5 Hypothesis Hypothesis 1: Awareness of the citizen is associated with training and promotional activities.

• H0: Awareness is not associated with training and promotional activities.

• H1: Awareness is associated with training and promotional activities.

Hypothesis 2: The percentage of respondents who were aware of the eGovernance services was very low.

• H0: The percentage of citizen who were aware about eservices was more than 50.

• H1: The percentage of citizen who were aware of eservices was less than 50.

Hypothesis 3: Citizens were more aware of educational eGovernance services than health eGovernance services

• H0: The awareness of Health and Educational eGovernance services is same.

• H1: Citizens are more aware of Educational eGovernance services than Health eGovernance services.

104 Hypothesis 4: Accessibility of the eService and Awareness of the eService are correlated.

• H0: Accessibility of the eServices are not correlated with the awareness about the eServices.

• H1: Accessibility of the eServices are correlated with the awareness about the eServices.

Hypothesis 5: Affordability factors (distance and time) are correlated with availability of the service.

• H0: Affordability factors (distance and time) are not correlated with availability of the service.

• H1: Affordability factors (distance and time) are correlate with availability of the service.

Hypothesis 6: Perceived usefulness is vital for the adoption.

• H0: Perceived usefulness is not vital for the adoption.

• H1: Perceived usefulness is vital for the adoption.

Hypothesis 7: Perceived ease of use will correlate with Single Identity.

• H0: Perceived ease of use will not correlate with provision of single identity.

• H1: Perceived ease of use will correlate with provision of single identity.

Hypothesis 8: Multi lingual, multi modal, multimedia services will increase ease of use.

• H0: Multi lingual, multi modal, multimedia factors are not correlate with perceived ease of use.

• H1: Multi lingual, multi modal, multimedia factors are correlate with perceived ease of use.

105 3.6 Explanation of Hypothesis Hypothesis 1: Awareness of the citizen is associated with training and promotional activities. This hypothesis was proved true in many works of marketing research in various sectors and it was evident in Marketing research. But in this citizen adoption towards eGovernance services research, the researcher felt the importance to prove the association between awareness and the importance of training and promotional activities. The Researcher assumed that, in citizen perceptive, the relevant Training and Promotional activities will increase the awareness about the eservice and thereby the usage of the eservice. The more citizen knows about the availability, features, advantages and the usage of the service, they can utilize the service with less effort and due to that the frequency of using the service will increase. The satisfied consumer can spread satisfaction in the society. So, awareness will increase adoption in the citizens. Hence this hypothesis was framed. Hypothesis 2: The percentage of respondents who were aware of the eGovernance services was very low. This hypothesis was made with the presumption that the percentages of the citizen who know eGovernance services are less than 50%. Hypothesis 3: Citizens were more aware of educational eGovernance services than health eGovernance services. This hypothesis was made with the assumption that even though the government is making efforts towards health services electronic as mentioned in the introduction chapter 1, still the percentage of the citizen who knows eGovernance services in the Health sector are less than the Education sector as educational services are mandatory for students and even parents need to know and utilize. Hypothesis 4: Accessibility of the service and Awareness of the service were correlated. Accessibility and Awareness are correlated. The Researcher had an assumption that awareness which can be defined as empowering the citizen by training and by providing material on the service, will have an effect on the accessibility of the utilizing the service. If the consumer

106 knows how to operate the service, the easiness in usage will increase. The researcher needs to test the dependency of Accessibility and Awareness factors of the concept formulated. Hypothesis 5 : Affordability factors like distance and time were correlated with the availability of the service. Affordability factors (distance and time) were correlated with the availability of the service. The researcher made this guess by assuming the following points. 1. The traveling efforts will reduce if the service is available at various modes like availability on mobiles, common facility centers, mobile vans. 2. The convenience of usage will increase by making the services available at one point of delivery. 3. Regular Maintenance of services will increase the convenience of usage. And the convenience of usage can be measured with the traveling distances to offices/departments to avail the service and also the time factor to utilize the service. Hypothesis 6: Perceived usefulness is vital for the adoption. Perceived usefulness is vital for the adoption. If the system meets the requirements of the target user, the user will tend to use the system with interest. The researcher made this assumption by giving importance to requirement gathering during the design process of eGovernance services. Hypothesis 7: Perceived ease of use will correlate with Single Identity. Single Identity will increase the easiness in utilizing the service. Perceived ease of use will correlate with Single Identity. The researcher made this guess by assuming the following point. As there is no need to carry too many cards, no need to authenticate with too many factors and too many times, the consumer may feel comfortable to use the service. Hypothesis 8: Multilingual, multimodal, multimedia services will increase the ease of use.

107 eGovernance implementation in the countries like India need to address the citizen requirements who will speak in various languages. As mentioned in the problem definition, the country is having citizens with semi-literate and also some are illiterate. For addressing the citizens with below poverty and to address the citizen above poverty level, various modes of service like citizen facility centres / citizen service centres (CSC), mobile vans and mobile based services are required. Under these assumptions, the researcher framed the mentioned hypothesis.

3.7 Research Design 3.7.1 Outline of the Research The study of the citizen adoption towards eGovernance is a vast area and the ideas are not clearly defined in the initial stage of research problem definition. A flexible research design is needed for this type of social science research. The research process is having 3 phases of research. In the first phase, the research was conducted with an exploratory research design. Qualitative research followed by quantitative research was conducted during the research process.

• Exploratory design: The below mentioned three methods were adopted while doing this exploratory study o The Study from Literature Review: Previous works were studied in the process of the literature review to know the concepts and ideas. The concepts and models defined by earlier researchers are reviewed and evaluated further to understand the research problem. Studied various policies and documents prepared by MeitY and National eGovernance Division (NeGD) to understand eGovernance scenario. o Experience Survey: Survey in the form of a semi structured interview was conducted with various experienced people in eGovernance and academicians and also with some common citizens who are very much interested in eGovernance and with those who are against with the system of eGovernance and technology. Discussed with the various senior level professional like eGovernance designers and developers and with implementers.

108 o Observation: Visited and observed various Government eGovernance websites. Given various lecturers in various colleges and in seminars about eGovernance and Digital India and tried to accumulate the opinions about the eGovernance. Visited various places from both urban and rural areas and observed the ground realities. Visited some of the hospitals in rural areas and tried to understand the problems in the implementation of government schemes. The targeted audiences were students, doctors, farmers, teachers, professors, senior level government official, and lower level staff. The researcher also interviewed various levels of citizens to know their problems in availing eGovernance services. o This exploratory research method helped the researcher to refine further the developed research problem and hypothesis developed earlier. o Exploratory research helped to determine the best research design, data collection method, and selection of subjects.

• Qualitative Research: o The qualitative research approach is a flexible open approach to enquire, describe and interpret any theory and the researcher was found this approach as a suitable method for framing the concept and also for the flexibility of gathering information. This method was selected to know what people are thinking but also why they thinking so. o The qualitative research involves the formulation of Hypothesis and the Questionnaire.

• Quantitative Research: o The quantitative research is statistical research that describes data and characteristics about the population or phenomenon being studied. In this research, the questions who, what, where, when and how will get answered. o The quantitative research involves in the testing of Hypothesis.

109 3.7.2 The Research methods: 3.7.2.1 Research Process Block Diagram

Figure 3.1: Research Process

3.7.2.2 Research Process This research study has employed a mixed method of research design which comprises of both qualitative and quantitative research techniques. By employing the mixed method approach, this research study was adopted best procedures to produce valid results for meeting objectives defined in the earlier section. Burke Johnson et al. (2007, p. 123) had defined mixed method of Research as “Mixed method of research is the type of research in which a researcher or team of researchers combine elements of qualitative and quantitative research approaches (e.g. use of qualitative and quantitative viewpoints, data collection, analysis, inference techniques) for the broad purposes of breadth and depth of understanding and corroboration”. According to Creswell and Plano Clark (2011), this type of approach enables researcher a greater degree of understanding which needs to formulate than adopting a single approach. Some authors stated that this type of approaches can be executed sequential and/or simultaneous manner. The mixed method of research further elaborated by many authors as

110 “By mixing both quantitative and qualitative research and data, the researcher gains in breadth and depth of understanding and corroboration, while offsetting the weaknesses inherent to using each approach by itself. “(21)

Dr. John Creswell (2003) has suggested a systematic framework for approaching the mixed method research. The Framework consists of four decisions and six strategies. (9)

Four Decisions for Mixed Method Designs (Creswell, 2003, p. 211) were: 1. What is the implementation sequence of data collection? 2. What method takes priority during data collection and analysis? 3. What does the integration stage of finding involve? 4. Will a theoretical perspective be used?

Six Strategies framed by Creswell were: 1. Sequential Explanatory: Collection and analysis of quantitative data followed by a collection and analysis of qualitative data. 2. Sequential Exploratory: An initial phase of qualitative data collection and analysis followed by a phase of quantitative data collection and analysis. 3. Sequential Transformative: Collection and analysis of either quantitative or qualitative data first. The results are integrated in the interpretation phase 4. Concurrent Triangulation: Two or more methods used to confirm, cross- validate, or corroborate findings within a study. Data collection is concurrent. 5. Concurrent Nested: A nested approach that gives priority to one of the methods and guides the project, while another is embedded or “nested.” 6. Concurrent Transformative: The use of a theoretical perspective reflected in the purpose or research questions of the study to guide all methodological choices.

In this research, the first and foremost objective is to identify and study various factors for citizen adoption towards eGovernance services. After the exploratory study, the researcher felt the importance of a mechanism to address the citizen adoption towards eGovernance services by giving equal importance to issues pertaining to both the provider and the consumer of the service. Considering the above point, the researcher has adopted qualitative design to frame a concept. As-mentioned in the above framework defined by Creswell , a Sequential Exploratory strategy was selected for

111 conducting this research. This type of strategy was selected for exploring the factors needed for citizen adoption study. This exploration further leads to the development of survey instrument needed for quantitative analysis.

The Sequential Exploratory design involved two phases. 1) An initial qualitative data collection and data analysis phase 2) A quantitative data collection and data analysis.

Qualitative Concept Quantitative Methodology Methodology

Figure 3.2: Hybrid Design

This qualitative approach provided the researcher flexibility while performing the research process. Off-course more time was consumed during this process and some participants were reluctant to respond and provide information. But that drawback also became a lesson in the research process and research tried to understand and observe the situations where and why participants were reluctant and why they don’t want to take part.

Below mentioned sections will address this Hybrid design in detail. • Qualitative Research process : Qualitative research was defined in the literature as ‘Qualitative research follows a flexible open approach to enquire, describe and interpret the human phenomenon, often in the words of selected individuals also known as informants. (2) According to Carr, 1976 qualitative researchers will be guided by certain ideas, perspectives and hunches regarding the subject to be investigated. Theory will be developed inductively.

According to previous researches, qualitative research was also used as a market research method that focuses on obtaining data through open-ended and conversational communication. On the grounds of previous researchers, the researcher was found the qualitative research as a suitable method for framing the concept and also for the flexibility of gathering information. This method is not only to know what people are thinking but also why they thinking so. With the above-mentioned definitions, the researcher selected the qualitative research technique for this study to get more

112 clarifications about the selected research subject and to further develop a concept for successful eGovernance adoption by the citizens of the country.

The qualitative research method selected for this research was in-depth Interviews. Data was collected with the help of structured and semi-structured interviews. Personal interview was carried out with one respondent at a time. The interview was conducted in a conversational method so that it invites opportunities to get details in depth from the respondent.

Scope of the study : Study was undertaken from different parts of the country and the researcher also conducted interviews through telephonic communication with some NRIs staying in other countries also. As mentioned earlier, citizen study is a topic of social science and the citizen belongs to the different category of the people among the different sectors or different parts of the country. So, the respondents were taken from different type of citizen and respondent size was forty.The respondents selected were from highly educated and experienced people in planning and designing eGovernance to the normal consumers of eGovernance and some were also illiterate.

Data collection: Data collected was verbal in nature. Almost all interviews were recorded with the permission of the respondents. Handwritten notes were also prepared during interviews.

Data Analysis and Interpretation: Data collected through interviews were summarized and categorized. The Grounded theory was selected because the theory was grounded from empirical observations i.e. constructs. The recorded interviews were carefully studied several times. The handwritten points noted were also studied at number of times. The points were summarized. The open coding technique was followed. Labeling was given to common points and coded carefully. Later these codes were categorized into constructs. These constructs further constituted into a theory of 4A Concept.

113 • Quantitative Research Process: Investigation stage: Through the above mentioned exploratory research methodology, the researcher formulated the 4A concept and identified the parameters for identified constructs during the qualitative research process. Using the derived factors, a data collection instrument in the form of a questionnaire was prepared before proceeding to the quantitative research process. Under this process, the researcher wants to study the data as per different demographic variables like Age, Type of area, Occupation, Qualification, and Income levels.

Questionnaire Development: The questionnaire is having 3 parts. Part A is the questions are related to the demographic information along with the usage of mobile and computer. Part B is the awareness of the citizens about educational and health eGovernance services and their experience in the terms of the prepared parameters. Part C is for gathering the opinion of the citizen as per the concept prepared by the researcher.

Scaling method: A Nominal scale was used to collect information about the respondent’s experience. Yes and No options were provided. Option like ‘Don’t know’ was also provided to make the respondent comfortable. In part B and in Part C, the Likert five-point scale was used to collect the opinion about the concept prepared by the researcher. Options for strongly agree, agree to strongly disagree were also provided on this scale. No opinion option was also provided to make the respondent comfortable.

Localization of the questionnaire: The questionnaire was provided in multilingual and multimodal ways. As the scope of the study was Maharashtra, the researcher was strongly felt the necessity of providing the instrument in multilingual especially in Marathi. The instrument was designed both in English and Marathi.

114 Accessibility Feature incorporated in Questionnaire: The Questionnaire was also prepared using Google forms and made it available on mobiles also. The screen reader facility was enabled so that the Google forms available to partially blind and blind people also. The request to fill the questionnaire was spread through the ‘whatsapp’ application and by SMS.

The prepared Marathi version of the questionnaire was shown and discussed with the experienced Marathi linguistics to know the correctness of the instrument and then conducted the survey.

Pilot study: The pilot study was conducted in Pune city’s urban and urban slum areas. Around forty samples were taken for consideration for the pilot study. The researcher had personally conducted the entire study to understand the situations and to know the comfort level of the respondent while giving the answers. During this study, the researcher has got feedback from the respondents. Some observations were made while respondent’s way of answering and interpreting the questions. After data analysis on pilot data, some changes were made to the questionnaire. The questionnaire was made more convenient so that the respondent can easily understand the questions.

Development of final Questionnaire: The questionnaire was prepared as per the below mentioned guidelines given in Research methodology literature. (5) 1. Questions are straight forward and simple to understand. 2. The respondents should not feel difficult to understand and answer. 3. The questions are not ambiguous and vague. 4. The time duration was also observed to answer the questionnaire. 5. The Select box (where tick mark is needed) was provided for all the questions and nowhere descriptive questions are asked expect for name and city information. 6. Not applicable, don’t known options are also provided wherever it is applicable to make the respondent comfortable.

115 Scope of the study: Even though it is important to study a broader area to understand the adoption and phenomena to increase the adoption in the citizen, due to time and cost factors, the researcher had confined the study to the Health and Education sectors within Pune district of Maharashtra. As this study was focused on citizen centric eGovernance services, the opinions of all categories of the citizens was needed to study. There are multiple reasons to select Pune district as the study area.

The reasons were: 1. Maharashtra is the second most populous state and third largest state in India. 2. Maharashtra is having high level scores in India’s eGovernment. 3. According to ‘eTAAL’ (etaal.gov.in) website, Maharashtra is in top 10 states who are executing the highest electronic transactions from 31-03-2013 to 31-05- 2018. (6) 4. Maharashtra is doing 456.11 transactions per thousand population and since Jan 2018, the total electronic transaction conducted was 51287736. (7) 5. Mahaonline which is citizen centric portal is having an electronic transaction count of 24.47(in Cr.) which shows the good sense of eGovernance in the state. (8) 6. Pune is a cultural capital of Maharashtra and the district is a combination of various citizens all over India. It is the second largest city of Maharashtra after Mumbai. Pune is named as “Oxford of the East” for the existence of well- known educational institutions and also the city is an administrative center and famous for its importance in automobile and other industry and now for IT hub. 7. The district is a having all categories of geographical and climatic conditions. 8. The researcher wants to conduct research on various types of areas like Urban, semi-urban, rural and tribal which are exists in Pune district. 9. The researcher is an officer of NIC working in Pune, it is very convenient to conduct research along with her responsibilities. As a senior officer of NIC, it is easy to conduct the research based on the contacts at various levels of society.

The study was conducted in various talukas of Pune district. Pune district is having 15 taluks. Pune district is subdivided into 4 subdivisions. The study was conducted by taking 2 talukas from each subdivision.

116 Figure 3.3: The Geographical location of Pune district is indicated in the map

Total Population of Pune (2011) (6) : 94,29,408

The sub Divisions of the district and taluks of each sub division of Pune are mentioned below. 1. Baramati a. Baramati Taluka b. Daund Taluka c. Indapur taluka 2. Bhor a. Bhor Taluka b. Purandar Taluka c. Velhe Taluka 3. Pune a. Haveli taluka b. Pune City 4. Shirur a. Khed Taluka b. Ambegaon Taluka c. Junnar Taluka d. Shirur Taluka 5. Maval a. Maval b. Mulshi

117 Determination of sample size: As mentioned above, the study was related to citizen centric research and scope mentioned above is Pune district. Survey methods for collecting data through the questionnaire were conducted through personal visits. The questionnaire was also published in Google forms. In this survey, the researcher was personally visited the areas to do the field study and also conducted the interviews along with data collection through the questionnaire.

Sampling technique : The judgment sampling (i.e. non probability sampling technique) was selected for the study.

Judgment sampling technique defined in the works of literature was “Purposive sampling is a non-probability sampling method and it occurs when “elements selected for the sample are chosen by the judgment of the researcher. Researchers often believe that they can obtain a representative sample by using a sound judgment, which will result in saving time and money”. (23)

The reasons for selecting this type of sampling were: 1. The researcher wants to investigate awareness and utilization of services in various types of areas like Urban, semi urban, rural and tribal. Judgment sampling was selected to cover all types of areas. For example, Junnar and Ambegaon talukas are having the tribal villages so both Junnar and Ambegaon talukas were selected for the study.

2. The researcher would like to observe the ground level realities and wants to know the opinions of the people in all parts of the district.

Pune district total population (as per 2011Census) 94,29,408 and on assuming 95% confidence level and 0.4% sampling error, the sample size was calculated as 754. (6) Pune district is having 5 subdivisions and 2 talukas were selected from each subdivision.

118 The details are presented in the below table. Table 3.1: Sampling details Source Taluka No. of Population No. of Semi No. Of (census Urban Urban No. of Tribal Number of 2011) cities Places Villages Villages Respondents Shirur Sub Division Ambegaon 2,13,842 143 0 1 1 77 Shirur 3,10,590 115 1 2 Junnar 3,69,806 181 1 1 100 Khed 3,43,214 185 6 Baramati Sub Division Baramati 3,72,852 116 2 50 Daund 3,41,388 102 2 20 Indapur 3,48,413 142 1 Bhor Sub Division Bhor 1,71,719 187 1 Purandhar 2,23,428 107 3 51 Velhe 55,874 124 0 27 Mawal Sub Division Mawal 3,05,083 181 0 Mulshi 1,27,385 143 0 1 1 50 Pune Sub Division PuneCity 26,95,911 1 3 200 Haveli 13,53,050 118 5 Pimpri- Chinchwad 1 200

Through Personal visits, the total respondents are: 870. Out of that the responses from Google forms were: 217.

Data Collection The researcher has used primary and secondary methods to collect data. For obtaining primary data, survey method was adopted by the researcher. For the effective and flawless data collection, the researcher has identified the problematic areas and corresponding precautions were taken by the researcher and those are mentioned below.

1. The citizen survey was conducted in rural and tribal areas and some respondents were illiterate. For helping the rural and tribal citizens and also to help the

119 illiterate (if any), the researcher (a non-Marathi speaking person) has taken a helper, a well Marathi speaking educated girl for the field study. This step was made the respondents to feel comfortable and many respondents voluntarily filled the questionnaire.

2. The researcher has visited even public places, parks, educational institutions, hospitals, courts, and police stations to get the data along with proper arrangement of pens and pads.

The survey has helped the researcher in the following ways: 1. The study has given a very good experience to understand the real scenario of eGovernance in the society.

2. A large amount of data was collected for quantitative analysis.

3. Personal Interviews were also conducted with some citizens to know their difficulties while availing the eGovernance services and also to know their opinions.

4. The field survey and observation which was done during this visit was helped the researcher to strengthen the qualitative analysis of the research.

Secondary Data was Collected by the below mentioned methods: 1. The literature review: Literature review was conducted by studying various books, journals, technical papers, articles, World Bank eGovernment assessment reports and documents, white papers and policy documents published by NSDG and MeitY.

2. Previous experience: As a part of job, the day to day interactions with the users of eGovernance services, the attitude and adoptability of the user was experienced by the researcher. Through the experience, the plus and minus points of these services are studied by the researcher as she is working in eGovernance development team.

120 3. Observation and study of various web sites and eGovernance services: The researcher did a study of various web sites and various eservices provided by the various Nations and also studied various mobile services at International and National scenarios.

Data Analysis and Interpretation: The questionnaire filled by the respondents were collected and edited for any inconsistency or incompleteness. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20.0 was used for the statistical analyses. Coding of variables in the quantitative research is very critical for better interpretation of results. All the variables were codified along with Gender, Age, Type of Area, Qualification, occupation, income levels and given a specific numeric value to each variable. The gathered data was codified and entered in to SPSS. Required analysis was done with the aid of SPSS. Appropriate statistical methods were applied on the data to get the results and they were analyzed. Microsoft Excel Version 2007 was also used for graph generation wherever it is required. The Detailed analysis of the research questions of this study was presented in the chapter Data Analysis and Hypothesis testing.

Assumptions and Limitations of the Study: eGovernance is vast in nature and it is continuous process. Research is needed in multiple aspects. As mentioned above, research is needed from various angles of the problem. Based on the available time and resources, the researcher has limited the scope to Health and Educational eGovernance services and limited the scope to Pune district only.

121 3.8 References (1) India .gov.in (2) Creswell, J. W., Plano Clark, V. L., Gutmann, M., & Hanson, W. (2003) (3) Integrating Quantitative and Qualitative Data in Mixed Methods Research—Challenges and Benefits by Sami Almalki1 in Journal of Education and Learning; Vol. 5, No. 3; 2016 ISSN 1927-5250 E-ISSN 1927-5269 (4) Burke Johnson et al. (2007, p. 123) (5) Questionnaire preparation tips (6) Pune District and population (7) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_India (8) http://censusindia.gov.in/ (Census 2011) (9) Research Rundowns blog (10) Creswell, J. W., & Clark, V. L. P. (2007). Designing and Conducting mixed methods research (11) Advanced mixed methods research designs. In A. Tashakkori & C. Teddlie (Eds.) (12) Handbook of mixed methods in social & behavioral research (pp. 209–240). (13) Handbook of mixed methods in social & behavioral research (pp. 135–164). (14) Journal of Mixed Methods Research, 3(3), 203–207. (15) Caracelli, V. J., & Greene, J. C. (1993). Data analysis strategies for mixed-method evaluation designs. (16) Choosing a Mixed Methods Design by Centre for Innovation for research and teaching (17) Bergman, M. M. (Ed.). (2008). Advances in mixed methods research: Theories and applications . Sage. (18) Creswell, J. W. (2013). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Sage Publications, Incorporated. (19) Creswell, J. W., Plano Clark, V. L., Gutmann, M. L., & Hanson, W. E. (2003). Advanced mixed methods research designs. Handbook of mixed methods in social and behavioural research, 209-240. (20) Johnson, R. B., Onwuegbuzie, A. J., & Turner, L. A. (2007). Toward a definition of mixed methods research. Journal of mixed methods research , 1(2), 112-133. (21) http://resourcecentre.foodrisc.org/mixed-methods-research_185.html (22) Research Methodology by Kothari (23) Research Methodology mentioned in https://research-methodology.net/ sampling-in- primary-data-collection/purposive-sampling

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