The government of Maharashtra has granted administrative approval to relocate the Maharashtra State Data Centre (MH-SDC) to Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited’s (BSNL) fort data centre in Mumbai under a cage co-location arrangement. A government resolution (GR) issued by the General Administration Department stated that the decision was taken in accordance with the approval granted at a meeting of the Information Technology High Power Committee held on January 9, chaired by the chief secretary.
The GR further highlighted that the absence of an independent disaster recovery centre for MH-SDC has increased the vulnerability of critical government systems, making it necessary to shift operations to a public sector undertaking-run cage co-location facility.
The MH-SDC, which hosts mission-critical applications, portals, databases and services of various state government departments, has been operational for more than 12 years.
The GR also observed that key IT, network, security, power supply and cooling infrastructure at the existing facility have reached end-of-life and end-of-support stages, creating operational, security and business continuity risks.
Additionally, the chief secretary of the state informed that a similar data centre will begin operations in Nagpur within the next three to four months. He said this will enhance the state’s data hosting capacity by at least 30 per cent and also improve the speed of government websites.
