The Union government has migrated approximately 16.68 lakh official email accounts to a cloud-based platform operated by Zoho, with total expenditure reaching Rs 180.10 crore so far, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) informed the Lok Sabha on April 1, 2026.
Migration to Zoho Cloud
The migration was executed through the National Informatics Centre (NIC), which appointed Zoho as the Master System Integrator for delivering a cloud-based email solution to government users. The selection followed a competitive bidding process on the Government e-Marketplace (GeM-CPPP), including a proof of concept (PoC) conducted with shortlisted bidders and various government user groups.
Secure and Sovereign Email System
According to the government, the initiative is aimed at establishing a secure and sovereign official email system for ministries and departments, ensuring that full ownership of data and intellectual property remains with the government.
"The project emphasises “Make in India” compliance and ensures that the Government retains full ownership of all data and intellectual property generated under the contract," the government said.
Pricing and Storage Details
MeitY stated that pricing for the email services ranges between Rs 170 and Rs 300 per account per month, depending on mailbox storage capacity varying from 30 GB to 100 GB. Payments are linked to the number of accounts successfully migrated to the platform.
The latest figures reflect a significant increase from December 2025, when the government had reported nearly 12.68 lakh accounts transitioned to the Zoho-based system, including 7.45 lakh belonging to central government employees.
This information was provided by Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology Jitin Prasada in the Lok Sabha.
