What do you do when municipal citizen service centres become popular for hassle-free issuance of birth certificates? Close them down, open an exclusive counter for issuing birth/death certificates at double the cost and manned by ill-trained personnel!
For the last few days, citizens have been shocked to notice that the citizen service centres located in all GHMC municipal circle offices have stopped issuing birth/death certificates.
Instead, a separate ‘MeeSeva’ counter has been opened near by, where Rs. 45 per copy has to be paid for obtaining a certificate, up from Rs. 20 being charged earlier by the service centres.
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This has riled public representatives as corporators cutting across party lines got a resolution passed in the council demanding citizen service centres be allowed to issue birth/death certificates. It happened after the IT department had directed the civic body to stop issuing birth/death certificates as the ‘MeeSeva’ counters are also issuing certificates with digital signatures, to “avoid duplication”.
“It was only after we strongly protested that the department relented and allowed birth/death certificates to be issued by the citizen service centres as the municipal corporation keeps the records. It’s shocking they found a new method to fleece people by charging double the fee only to provide more revenue for meeseva,” charged Telugu Desam floor leader Singireddy Srinivas Reddy.
That the citizen service centres used to issue close to 25,000 certificates each month while the designated ‘MeeSeva’ centres were issuing one-fourth the number is an indicator of the citizens preferences, he pointed out, demanding immediate reversal of the latest decision.
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