The department of commerce has developed the GeM portal to bring transparency to the old public procurement tender process by government departments. Public procurement is how state-owned enterprises and government departments purchase services and goods for their operational needs from the private sector.
GeM portal is the public acquisition gateway offering start-to-finish answers for all acquirement needs of focal and state government divisions, PSUs, independent foundations, and nearby bodies.
A particular reason vehicle (SPV) by the name of Government e-Marketplace (GeM SPV) was set up as the public obtainment gateway.
Since its beginning on August 9, 2016, GeM has changed public acquisition in the nation by utilizing innovation and making acquirement contactless, paperless, and credit only.
The stage lessens manual cycle shortcomings and human mediations in acquirement and empowers expanded inclusion, access, and productivity of anonymous, normalized public acquisition.
It gives the apparatuses of e-offering, inverts e-sale, and requests conglomeration to work with the public authority clients, to accomplish the best incentive for their cash.
The buys through GeM by Government clients have been approved and made compulsory by the service of money by adding another Rule No.149 in the General Financial Rules, 2017.
The GeM portal aims to enhance efficiency, transparency, and speed in public procurement along with inclusion. It provides the tools of reverse e-auction, e-bidding, and demand aggregation to help government users/buyers get the best value for their money.
The GeM portal’s main objective is to facilitate government departments to procure services or products with the right quality, quality, volume, and sources in defined timelines. Government users and sellers need to register themselves as buyers and sellers respectively to avail of the online GeM portal benefits.
Buyers on the GeM Portal
The following organizations can register on the GeM portal as buyers and are authorized to make procurement through the portal:
- Central Government.
- State government ministries.
- State government departments, including its subordinate offices.
- Central and state autonomous bodies.
- Central and state PSUs and local bodies.
The following government officers/head of offices can register their organizations as primary users on the GeM portal:
- Any officer of
- Central Government.
- State government.
- Public Sector Units (PSU).
- Autonomous bodies, local bodies, constitutional bodies, or statutory bodies at the deputy secretary of government level.
- Head of the office at sub-centre, unit, or branch.
The primary users are responsible for registering their organisations on the GeM portal, but they cannot participate in the procurement. They need to create user accounts for the secondary users, assign them roles and responsibilities and supervise all secondary users transactions on the portal.
The secondary users are the buyers for the procurement of the organisation. However, a primary user can be a consignee to receive a service/product. The secondary users are officials responsible for procurement on the GeM portal, including receipt of stores, placement of contracts, payment to the sellers, etc.
The primary user can give the secondary users the role of a buyer, consignee, Drawing and Disbursing Officer (DDO), paying authority, etc. The buyer is the official responsible for processing procurement transactions till the order placement stage. The consignee will be the secondary user responsible for accepting the goods procured and certifying receipt in the buyer organisation.