Mumbai: After facing an accusation of 'random collection of data in an unscientific way' on their latest report on the state of health in Mumbai, the Praja Foundation on Monday said they had only presented whatever information Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) officials had provided them with.
Praja Foundation also said it was hard to co-ordinate with the BMC as they would often cancel appointments, adding they should work on solving problems of 18 people dying everyday of tuberculosis (TB) instead ofsidetracking the issue by saying the data is wrong.
Praja had released a white paper on the state of health in Mumbai on July 12, which showed a rise in TB programme defaulter rates and an increase of TB and dengue cases in the city.
The BMC alleged the report is incorrect by calling it unscientific and asked Praja to issue a public apology. Praja has challenged this accusation. “They had given the data and we merely represented it. In the past, we have filed RTIs but BMC officials have often denied us centralised data and asked us to go to different wards, which is what we did,” said Milind Mhaske, Project Director at Praja Foundation.
“The BMC is one of the most efficient civic bodies in the country when it comes to maintaining data on births and deaths but they need to show the same efficiency with all public data,” he said.
Reacting to the BMC’s allegation of interpreting the data unscientifically, Mr. Mhaske said, “One of the reasons why they said our report on the TB programme was incorrect was because, according to them, they had changed the definition of ‘defaulter’ in their records. But this was the first time we were hearing of such a change. We only presented the data they gave us and calculated according to the standard definition of a defaulter in 2012.”
Dr. Padmaja Keskar, Executive Health Officer at the BMC, said, “The Foundation should confirm the data with us before going ahead with the publication. RTI also has its limitations and we cannot release all the data that we have.”
In reply, Mr. Mhaske said, “We are under no obligation to take inputs from them while publishing the report. Nevertheless, we tried to get in touch with them but on several occasions, they were either unavailable or the appointments were cancelled.”
On being asked about these cancelled appointments, Dr. Keskar said, “They have not taken any appointments at any point of time.” Maintaining its stand, Praja said it wanted to collaborate with the government and not just be confrontational.
“The mandate of public heath is with the BMC and we are only offering a mirror to their functioning and giving them feedback. Every taxpayer is a stakeholder in these issues and the BMC should not show such lack of accountability,” Mr. Mhaske said. Praja’s suggestion is that if the BMC thinks the data is wrong, the civic body should come up with the right data and publicise it. “They stopped doing it in 2007 and we, as an NGO, are pursuing that now,” he said.
The BMC recently released information on steps that they had taken to curb mosquito-borne diseases in the city.
Mr. Mhaske praised the civic body’s move. “It will be better if they release data about diseases affecting the citizens of Mumbai more frequently and clarify whether this is an ad hoc practice or it is done on a periodic basis,” he said.
