Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal may have scrapped a formal Janata Darbar after the experiment on Saturday ended up in chaos but Karnataka true to being the information technology (IT) capital has used IT to enable a people-friendly Janata Darshan.
Grievance-stricken people waiting at the doors of the Chief Minister’s home office, “Krishna”, can now return home satisfied and so is the Chief Minister who is able to resolve as many grievances as possible within a quick time.
The programme, normally scheduled on alternate Tuesdays, commences with people from far and near queuing up behind one of the eight to 10 counters set up on the premises to lodge their grievances and receive an acknowledgement through SMS with the grievance number, and also a printed slip.
By the time their turn to meet the Chief Minister comes, the IT-enabled service ensures that their complaints are sent to the relevant department with a quick feedback.
“When they meet the Chief Minister, his remarks are also entered into the system. This way, we are able to attend to all complaints. Visitors can track their complaints by calling Sakala call centre on Ph: 080-44554455,” said Shalini Rajneesh, Mission Director of Sakala, the flagship project guaranteeing services to citizens within a stipulated time. During the last two Janata Darshan, now named Janaspandana, 523 and 685 grievances had been received and 126 and 89 of them resolved,respectively. As many as 97 of the more than 1,200 grievances had been rejected as they were found “ineligible”. The remaining grievances are in various stages of redressal.
Ms. Rajneesh sought to compare the orderly Janaspandana with the reported chaos at the Aam Aadmi Party Government’s first Janata Darbar in Delhi. The programme here is managed through an electronic web-based and SMS-enabled software. “Right from receipt of applications, queue control, routing of complaints to the office, district and department concerned and resolution is electronic,” she said.
Bhimarao Shinde, a key official in the Chief Minister’s office tasked with the arrangements for Janaspandana, that said people started arriving for the programme at 6.30 a.m., though the programme starts by 9 a.m. “The visitors are served tea and given refreshments while they wait. We categorise people into disabled, senior citizens, and the Chief Minister himself goes to them and hears them out,” she said.
Ms. Rajneesh said that a majority of the citizens attending the programmes request for houses, sites and employment. “These obviously can’t be given off the shelf. There is a system in place to identify the beneficiaries and this programme helps putting them in the loop,” she added.
