Bhubaneswar: The housing and urban development department has decided to introduce more online services for citizens under its e-municipality initiative.

The department has already introduced an online birth certificate registration process in most urban local bodies of the state. In the next phase, it has been decided to introduce 17 more services.

The focus area would be on online death and marriage certificate registration, holding tax payment, electricity and water bill payment, user fee payment, trade licence, grievances and building permission.

"The e-municipality is successfully running in Bhubaneswar and Puri and a lot of people are benefiting from it. We have decided to extend the online services across the state now. The process of making online building permission has already been initiated," said a department official.

Once introduced, citizens will be able to save time and resources. Several services, including marriage and death certificate registration, will remain partially online, while people will get the forms from the website and will be able to submit the same with the required documents physically at the office concerned.

Other than certificates, the services will remain entirely online for payment of various utility bills.

"We are introducing the services in a phased manner. Some urban local bodies have already started the portal while some others have started the birth and death certificate registration process," said the official.

Bhubaneswar has already introduced such online services for people living there.