With hats to protect them from scorching heat, groups of students huddled around clipboards discussing which way to head, from the police booth on the Elliot's Beach. The setting seemed like the starting point of a treasure hunt except the treasure the students were after was valuable data on waste management systems, public sanitation and facilities for pedestrians.
On Saturday, the first leg of Transparent Chennai's Ward Accountability Experiment kicked off with 45 groups surveying 10 streets of Ward 152 (Adyar east). The experiment is to provide baseline data about local issues for the Chennai Corporation elections due next month, said Siddharth Hande, consultant researcher, Transparent Chennai.
“This tool kit is a model that can be downloaded from our website and used by people in other wards too,” he said. “A public meeting with residents will be held in the first week of October so that the implications of the findings can be discussed,” he added.
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The core group of volunteers from the Human Rights Department of Ethiraj College for Women, Environment Club of Sri Venkateswara College of Engineering (SVCE), Departments of Marine Studies and Social Work, Madras Christian College, and the Rotaract Club of Madras, and other partner organisations, helped mapped such things as surface garbage in a given area and documented the nature of the trash that was found in the local environment. “Each group also has a photographer so we document everything we see and upload it onto the Transparent Chennai website. Anyone can click on the image and get the relevant information,” said Ramesh Rajesh, a student from SVCE. The experiment, which is described as a way of “democraticising data collection,” successfully mapped 10 streets near the beach during the first public data gathering session.
The subsequent sessions would be held on September 17 and 24 and is open to the public. Information can be obtained from www.transparentchennai.
com.
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