For a district that is used to seeing itself sit high on socio-economic indices, Dakshina Kannada finds itself languishing at the bottom – with even “backward” districts of Chamrajnagar, Koppal, Raichur, Yadgir way above – in the Sakala rankings for June.
In April, Dakshina Kannada was positioned second in the table of districts in the implementation of the right to services scheme. By May, the district stood 15th, and by June it slid further down to 27, with only Gulbarga and Bidar faring worse.
Taluk-wise, figures reveal pitiable performances: Belthangady taluk has taken last place in the table (at rank 176), preceded by Sullia (175) and Bantwal (170).
“It pains me to know the district is performing this badly. The scheme needs to be tightened here,” said Shalini Rajneesh, Principal Secretary, Department of Public Administrative Reforms, and Mission Director of Sakala, during a press conference on Monday.
However, Additional Deputy Commissioner K. Dayanand attributed the slip in rankings to a “saturation point” in the district, wherein the number of applications could not increase any further.
“Our population is less and so applications are less too. Moreover, we have our own system of PLO (Paper Less Office), wherein applications are online, and this does not integrate with the Sakala system,” he said.
This was contradicted by officials from the Mission who said the rating system took into consideration applications per 1 lakh of population.
“During June, applications stopped coming here. This may be due to lack of awareness, or even due to rains,” said an official.
Rejection rate
Ms. Rajneesh, however, praised the district for the “active” role of the Sakala helpdesk and the relatively lower rejection rate of applications.
While the state average of Sakala applicants who approached the helpdesk was 0.63 per cent, in Dakshina Kannada, 1.23 per cent approached the desk, she said.
Police laxity delays Sakala
Among the worst faring departments in the district in terms of Sakala implementation is the Police department. As of Monday, the department had 126 files that had not been disposed even after due date. However, the district administration seems clueless as to what to do with the pending cases.
“For other departments, we can serve a showcause notice. But for police, we just can’t,” said K. Dayanada, Additional Deputy Commissioner here on Monday.
