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How
we started…
PRAJA
is a non-partisan, voluntary organisation which was started in Bombay
in 1997 by a group of 8 individuals committed to the re-establishment
of accountability and transparency in public governance through
people’s participation.
Our
Motivation…
The efficient functioning of public services
has a direct and important bearing on the daily lives of its citizens.
However, lack of transparency, non-performance and corruption result
in high levels of frustration in most interactions for citizens.
The situation is difficult to remedy as there are no standards against
which performance of public services can be measured and no structured
forum within which performance is discussed or feedback provided.
Being
residents of Mumbai, we had all interacted with the public service
providers at some level or the other. Like most citizens, there
was a high degree of frustration arising from these experiences
and we began dismissing these public service agencies as "hopelessly
inefficient" and "never going to improve". But we felt that this
attitude led to apathy and complete indifference to functioning
of these agencies resulting in complete lack of people’s participation
in areas directly influencing their lives. Reviewing their responsibility
as citizens in stemming the deterioration in public services, Praja
was established as a body to create pressure and influencing the
City Government into establishing a pro-citizen work ethic.
Our
objectives…
To
increase Public Accountability - Public accountability holds individuals
who provide public services responsible for performance that can
be measured objectively. Though there is a system of accountability
built into the hierarchy of the municipality, it does not extend
to users of their services who often find themselves completely
invisible in the large administrative process and therefore easily
ignored.
To
generate an effective feedback mechanism - In a system of mutual
accountability there is constant need for service-providers to be
open to feedback from people using their services. For a system
of feedback to be effective, it is essential to eliminate lengthy
administrative procedures and create a forum where there is a direct
consumer-service provider communication and enhance collaboration.
To
disseminate Information on public services- Information shared would
provide both the service users and the service-providers a common
point from which to work. It would also encourage transparency in
the functioning of the governing and administrative bodies.
The
Praja Team. . .
- Nitai
Mehta
- Sumangali
Gada
- Ajay
Hattangdi
- Sunil
Alva
- Gavin
De Sa
- Anuj
Bhagwati
- Maheen
Mirza
Our
Projects. . .
The
Citizen's Charter
We
developed a comprehensive directory of information on the services
of the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC). This directory is what
is called the Citizen’s Charter and essentially contains information
on the various services of the BMC, the speed and quality with which
the BMC commits to provide these services and a clear procedure
for complaints redress regarding any of the BMC services.
Project
Performance
This
initiative seeks to provide performance evaluation and feedback
to the BMC based on the standards as committed to in the Citizens’
Charter, through opinion polls/ surveys. The survey will record
an appraisal by the citizens of the political and administrative
units in their area. The elected representatives and bureaucrats
responsible for the quality of services, will be “rated” by a survey
conducted by an independent agency in all 23 wards of the city.
This public evaluation will be repeated every 6 months as we believe
that our elected representatives and the public service officials
should perform their duties and be responsive to the needs of the
electorate at all times – not just before an election. The results
of our first survey are to be released shortly.
Training
And Workshops with BMC Officials
The
Citizen’s Charter would cease to be an effective instrument if
there was no appropriate response from the municipal staff who
actually work at the point of consumer interface. Most employees
of public service providers lack the necessary knowledge and skills
to provide consistently high standards of service and are usually
not in a position to service citizens in an efficient and customer
friendly manner. Realising this the BMC in partnership with Praja
decided to have interactive workshops with those officials, at
the Ward level, that directly deal with the citizen.
Citizen's
Charter For The Mumbai Police
Praja
has already initiated work on the Citizens’ Charter for the Police
of Mumbai. The former Director General of Police an Ex-Police
Commissioner, are providing the guidance for this project. As
this project will involve legal input, we have invited a legal
counsel to work with us.
What
the future holds…
- Developing
an efficient and effective complaint redress system
- Continuing
training programmes with the BMC staff
- Features
and Newspaper Columns
- Networking
with like-minded organisations
- Increasing
People's Participation by liasoning with residents groups and
other citizen’s bodies
- Forming
a Pressure Group of eminent citizens to hold dialogues with the
BMC for improvement
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