Series of meetings planned to bring mass awareness, pressure groups to demand implementation
Whether the 'Right to Services Act' becomes a reality or not, citizens seem to be ready to take from the government all that they can in terms of deliverance with their own 'RTS'. And chief minister Devendra Fadnavis's announcement to improve the delivery system through right to services has pumped up their excitement no end.
In what is starting as a two-part public meeting initially and will later spread into a bigger drive, a group of citizens will be creating awareness and pressure groups for implementation of the Government Servants Regulation of Transfers and Prevention of Delay in Discharge of Official Duties Act (Act 21 of 2006). A number of citizens call the Act as their own Right to Services Act — a shorter form — which just needs implementation. Though the Act was put into force in 2006, it has not seen effective implementation till date. The rules for the Act were framed in 2013. It was primarily enacted to keep a tab on the official delivery mechanism with some citizen charter towards the time-bound services.
Hence, activists feel that it can make do with this instead of a new Act. To create awareness and pressure groups, the meetings will be held jointly by Church in the City (CIC), a political arm of the church, Action for Good Governance and Networking in India, an NGO working towards civic issues, Lokadhikar, which is instrumental for the awareness of the existing Act and other NGOs.
"I have done one or two meetings before. The idea is to create awareness and form pressure groups. The CM has great powers; if he says he wants effective implementation, it will deliver in a big way. There may be some additional rules needed but we will ask for its implementation after the awareness drive," said Shailesh Gandhi, who will be addressing a gathering on November 20 on this issue.
"We want a bit of insight into the Act. Most of the representatives of various churches in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region, which has over 110 churches, will be coming for the meeting. A committee will be formed and the issue will be taken at a grass roots level. People do not have an idea about the Act. These meetings will help create awareness," said Willie Shirsat, chief secretary of CIC, which will be hosting the first meeting followed by similar meetings at the parish level. The meetings will be open to all communities.
Activists also hope that the popularity of the Act will help them make citizens more empowered. "It is a powerful tool for those who want fast redressal. The Act makes it mandatory for response to be time-bound. We are for empowering people. It is about time NGOs should close down and individual citizens should be driving things. They should be able to fight for their rights on their own and this will ultimately lead to good governance. We are also looking to train officers at the civic administration level so that they know how the Act functions. The idea is also to put such meetings on YouTube so that more and more people know about them," said Rajkumar Sharma, member of Almanac, an umbrella organisation of various ALMs in Chembur.
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