The Central Vigilance Commission with the help of the Indira Gandhi National Open University and the Union Human Resource Ministry will soon launch “VigEye”, short for vigilance eye. The eye will be a platform for submitting complaint against corruption through mobile phones and Internet. This project is set to reach the rural population through the university’s regional centres.
The “VigEye” was announced on the occasion of International Anti-Corruption Day here on Sunday in which IGNOU hosted a teleconference session with the CVC in which vigilance commissioner R. Sri Kumar said: “People can lodge their complaint with the help of photographs, audio and video.”
He also announced that the project will soon be upgraded to “VigEye Shree”, “VigEye Vibhushan” and “VigEye Ratna” to encourage people to fight corruption. “There has to be a change in the strategy. It is a long process today; by the time we take action the time elapses. Now, through “VigEye”, we shall reach out to the common people and tell them, what should be done and what should be avoided,” he added.
He explained that participative vigilance can be incorporated among the masses through mobile phones. “You can send a blank SMS or “VIGEYE” to 09223174440 to get an SMS containing the registration link in your mobile. You have to register first, before filing a complaint,” he said. The project will have volunteers at the village level to help spread awareness.
He added that they wanted to take this project further to the public domain for students and make it simpler to use so that the complaints can be lodged easily in audio, video and photography mode.
IGNOU Vice-Chancellor Prof. Gopinath Pradhan announced a new curriculum in the university that would include moral ethics and vigilance.
CVC director Keshav Rao said the transparency in public vigilance, particularly in procurement and defined corruption as monopoly plus discretion minus accountability. “Transparency, fairness, quality, time and value for money are various factors propagated by CVC for addressing different departments.”
