The Hindu : Time for projecting a pro-people image

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jul 14, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka

Time for projecting a pro-people image

By T.S.Ranganna

Bangalore July 13. Elections may come as a blessing in disguise to the poor. The ruling party schedules populist programmes during this time with an attempt to project them as routine development work. But the people view the programmes as something that will benefit them.

While the midday meal scheme was launched with an aim to derive direct electoral benefit, an attempt was made to "rejuvenate" the Public Grievances Redressal Cell (PGRC) by appointing a senior IAS officer as its head in the name of helping the poor.

There is no doubt that this step will benefit the people if the officer reorganises the public grievance mechanism.

Till Raghavan Suresh, who was shifted as Principal Secretary (Food Processing), was appointed to head it, the PGRC was one of the many departments under the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms. He was not given posting for four months. He obtained a court order directing the Government to give him a posting.

He issued a legal notice after which he was asked to take over as head of the PGRC.Mr. Suresh is enthusiastic to make the cell people-friendly. "People rush to legislators, ministers, and politicians because of the perception that officials are less helpful in solving their grievances. Initially, I did not receive any grievance. I want to change the mindset of the people and the officers. The whole exercise will be done in a systematic and scientific manner," he says.

Any issue can be brought to the Government for redressal. There are some 36 types of grievances which include land disputes, financial help and relief, police protection, loan waiver, compensation for land acquisition, land grant, site or house distribution, drought relief, drinking water supply, employment to the poor, old-age pension, service matters, slum-dwellers problems, investigation into murder cases, harassment to dalits, etc. Mr. Suresh undertook a tour of the drought-hit districts of Kolar, Tumkur, Chamarajanagar, Mandya, and Mysore. The common complaint was shortage of drinking water. It was acute in Kolar District, and the Deputy Commissioner sought Rs. 29 crore to tackle the problem.

He plans to tour two or three districts every month.

In Tumkur District, Mr. Suresh said, people had complained of fodder shortage, and he had sent a report to the Additional Chief Secretary and Development Commissioner. In Mandya, which is the home district of the Chief Minister, sugarcane growers demanded compensation for crop loss.

Mr. Suresh will meet people from Bangalore Rural District at his office in Podium Block on Monday at 11 a.m. He said K.Jairaj, Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, S.M. Krishna, had asked him to take steps to integrate the public grievances redressal wings into one. He said follow-up action would be taken after the Chief Minister's "Janata Darshan". There were 1,250 applications pending with the heads of departments and 1,100 with the deputy commissioners. Besides, the Chief Minister himself received around 500 petitions during every "Janata Darshan."

Mr. Suresh said he would look into them (grievances) during his visits to offices and attempt to redress them.

He did not agree with the observation that the petitions received by the Chief Minister got immediate attention and not the others.

Quoting a report, he said that 87 per cent of the petitions received from April 2002 to March 2003 had been disposed of. Sixty-six per cent of the grievances were redressed, and a little over 20 per cent of the people did not get any relief.

It was during the tenure of Ramakrishna Hegde as Chief Minister that the cell was set up, and the former minister, A.Lakshmisagar, was given additional charge of it. However, he was divested of the charge later.

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