The Centre has migrated approximately 16.68 lakh official email accounts to a cloud-based platform operated by Zoho, with total spending reaching Rs 180.10 crore so far, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) informed the Lok Sabha on April 1.

The transition has been carried out by the National Informatics Centre (NIC), which onboarded Zoho as the Master System Integrator to deliver a secure cloud-based email service for government users. The selection was made through a Government e-Marketplace (GeM-CPPP) bidding process, which included a proof-of-concept phase involving shortlisted vendors and feedback from government user groups.

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According to the government, the move is part of a broader push to establish a secure and sovereign communication system for ministries and departments. A key aspect of the initiative is that full ownership of data and intellectual property remains with the government. MeitY also outlined the pricing structure, noting that email accounts are billed between Rs 170 and Rs 300 per month, depending on storage capacity ranging from 30 GB to 100 GB. Payments are linked directly to the number of accounts that have been migrated to the platform.

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The latest update reflects steady progress compared to December, when the government had reported around 12.68 lakh accounts had been shifted to the Zoho-based system, including 7.45 lakh belonging to central government employees.