To,
Shri Pravin pardeshi
Hon. Commissioner,
BMC , Mumbai.
Sub: Promises of Good Governance, Transparency
need to be
Reflected in Action.
Firstly heartiest
congratulation for getting appointed as BMC commissioner.
Now-a-days, everyone makes promises
about ‘Good governance and transparency’ after joining the new post . But,
unfortunately in reality “action” totally differs from the promises made. Politicians and Executives concerned with BMC had
also made such promises previously but
we citizens never found reflections of such promises in Day to Day functioning
of BMC.
Recently, media news has also put
a big question mark over performance of BMC especially after Himalaya
incidence. Secondly, Roads with potholes and cleaning of nullahs seems to be
unresolved issues of BMC for years together. Off course several such issue are
there . Why it is so? Why grass route
scenario remains unchanged in spite of assurances of good governance and
transparent governance. We citizens fell that, Transparency and Good
Governance should be “visible” to Public. The objective of this letter is to
underline this issue.
All assurances need to be translated into action:
A big question is that, in what respect
transparency is there in BMC? Citizens are totally unaware of BMC’s
functioning. Citizens are totally in dark about the projects and the cost of
the projects. Ground reality is that, citizens have to struggle a lot to get
information through RTI also. They have to fight and need consistent follow-up
to receive the information. In spite of all this, if somebody claims of
transparency in BMC he needs to be saluted.
Actually, we citizens always have a
big question that everyone speaks about transparency then what pulls back them
from uploading all relevant data on website of BMC. Local governance, state
Government and central Government speak about transparency, but still citizens
are kept in darkness which proves ultimately that all the tears about
transparency are “crocodile’s tears.”
In case one claims that, ‘Like
election manifesto issue ‘transparency’ is also a weapon to misguide the
citizens,’ then nothing wrong in it.
GOOD GOVERNANCE: A FOUL PLAY:
Unnecessary work like repetitive
repairing of footpath / gutters/ manholes/ roads, replacement of paver blocks,
benches, unnecessary reconstruction of bus stops is considered as a fundamental
right by every corporators . Everybody,
when gets elected starts with same work.
Question need to answer that,
is all this is a part of so called vision of BMC? Notices for work issued in
news paper underlines the Siphoning of fund on repetitive unnecessary work. Such Siphoning of crores of rupees shows the
insensibility of administration. It
needs to change urgently.
Recently, the corporation seems
to be functioning in a totally uncontrolled way. Because of expenditure over unnecessary work,
more than 50 % of funds gets siphoned off. Off course, it’s open secret that
the “repetitive unnecessary work” is made possible by virtue of vested interest
of politicians and bureaucrats. To cope
up with the skyrocketing expenditure, the simplest way adopted by BMC is
raising the taxes and further rise in fund is used blindly. This vicious cycle
is being repeated years together. “Money
saved is money gained” principle is buried due to Non-Transparent way of
functioning of BMC.
Just take a simple example of BMC
street lights. Proper management of
streetlight / high mast ON-OFF system
can save daily around 80-90 thousand as the number of street lights in Mumbai
are more than 60 thousand . What
provisions are extended by corporators with crores of rupees corporator
fund is always unanswered question. Several
such things are there where BMC can save huge money. These are the just representative examples of
wastages of fund. But who cares for people’s money?
“Repetitive unnecessary work, maximum rate, minimum
quality” seems to be the hidden policy of BMC.
With current scenario the claim of
Good Governance turns as a foul play. Every Mayor and commissioner repetitively
made claim that fund will be sanctioned only for ‘required work’. But till
today ‘required work’ term remains unidentified. Whose requirement? Requirement
of officers, leaders, contractor or citizens?
PROOF OF
HONESTY LIES IN ACTION:
Hon.
Commissioner Sir, the proof of honesty, transparency and good governance always
lies in action. So in your era citizens
are expecting ground level actions which reflect all the qualities that come
under ‘good governance’
The possible steps
to fulfill your assurance of Good and transparent governance are:
·
FINANCIAL TRANSPERENCY : To upload the information of each and every work
with full of information like : nature of work , cost, period for which quality
guarantee is assured, info about of the same work which was carried out
previously , contractors’ details, name of the BMC officer who is the in charge of work.
·
NEED TO AVOID REPETATIVE WORK: Its has been observed that some of the work like
repairing of footpaths , gutters, covers of manholes, roads , dividers, circles
need to be avoided. To curb the siphoning of people’s money on such unwanted
repetitive work, for every work maintenance clause of certain period must be
included in the tender clause. For example ones foot path constructed 7 years
free of cost maintenance must be mandatory with contractors. Same strategy should be obtained for all
works.
·
Mandatory visit of OFFICERS: Overall
culture that is well known to every one that, about 80% Engineers/ executives
never visit the site. They use to trust the concerned contractors for “quality
of work”. This has to change urgently.
Make mandatory on all executives to
visit the work site and upload the photo of work on website at all steps of
work. This will definitely stand fruitful to curb the vested interest of the
contractors and executives.
·
Gio Tagging of
work: Here after to avoid repetitive
unnecessary work Gio Tagging of work policy can be implemented.
·
For illegal construction both the ward officer
and local corporators must be held totally responsible and accountable.
·
Before
presenting the budget it must be made mandatory to carry out the audit of
previous year. Along with this TRIPARTY Audit must be made mandatory.
·
TIME BOUND TRANSFER POLICY: As all aware of the root cause behind corruption is
vested interest of the officers and a handshake with politicians. To curb this,
the system must be so redefined that every employee gets transferred
automatically after completion of 3 years tenure. Inter-transfer between
different corporations will turn the best solution.
·
Provision of multilayer DUCT: While construction of any road the utmost importance
must be given for provision of multilayer duct, laying of crossing pipes after
300/500 meters, to curb wasting of money on frequent repairing of roads due to
digging.
·
Need to monitor department’s
Reply: It has been observed that,
whenever any complaint/letter to Commissioner’s office, it has been forwarded
to concerned dept very promptly. But as there is no cross checking policy,
concerned dept use to dumb that letter.
To overcome such act by various dept, hereafter make mandatory to
concerned dept to mark copy of reply to commissioners office along with the
complainer.
·
Availability
of ONLINE info of use of corporater’s
fund.
·
“All equally
responsible means nobody is responsible” seems to be working culture of
corporations because of which quality deterioration responsibility remains
without unearth. Responsibility policy
should be fixed. For every work certain
years Quality assurance need to be made mandatory.
·
Provision
of Active participation of citizens needs to be framed.
Make some provision so that citizens can play vital role in informing
“ZERO GROUND REALITY FACT” of any work to commissioner office. Make availability of Whats app number or mail
id where citizens can inform the grass route reality of their region to commissioner.
·
Need of review
of illegal /unauthorized water connections.
·
Cash
transactions for paying different bills to BMC need to avoid. By giving special
discount, all transactions must be made mandatory ‘e-transactions’.
·
Implementation
of “citizen’s charter” to gear up the delivery system for people.
·
ON LINE GRIEVANCE PORTAL: To overcome the current one way communication culture
from citizen to administration only, some responsive team should be set, so
that the grievances from people will not remain unattended. For every complaint
citizens must get docket number.
·
Property tax
is the main source of income for BMC. It is learn that in most cases carpet
area is shown less than the actual area to decrease the property tax of those
citizens. As BMC does settlement with
defaulters, most defaulters deliberately avoids paying property tax regularly.
Hence, stringent action needed against the defaulters. All employees and officers working for more
than 3 years at same department need to be transferred as it is a sensitive
department.
·
Utmost
attention has to be paid to local health centers of BMC.
·
CURB CORRUPTION IN EDUCATION Dept: Education is a Nobel cause. Corruption in purchasing
of 27 items which is provided to students need to be curb. Market strategy is
that, when purchased quantity increases, rate decreases but in case of BMC it
was found that in spite of huge quantity purchase rate is almost double/triple
than the market standard rate. Quality of purchased items is also a big issue.
·
Implementation of Autonomous vigilance section to
get rid of sky rocketing corruption.
·
Till today the
contractor decides which work is to be carried out. For said work right from
preparation of file and sanctioning same will be totally done by contractor. An
officer just acts as a rubber stamp with greased palm. This culture of preparation of file by
contractor and moving same from table to table urgently need to stop.
·
Mandatory
field visit to all officers before taking any decision about work or
sanctioning bill of said work. Current culture is that even a ward officer
never visits his ward area.
·
General
observation is that, action against street hawkers is just a eyewash. All drama
get over 2/3 hours. Some of the local
vendors claim that they are paying “hafta” of RS. 1000 to Rs. 5000 as per the
place of business and turnover of business.
·
Unwanted
repetitive work of garden department must be overruled.
·
FILE TRACKING SYSTEM:
To curb the purposeful act of delay and deny, “Table to Table file
Movement TRACK system” need to be implemented urgently. On the back side of
front cover of file columns like “ Sr. No , receive date , name of the officer
and section , remarks , reason for
denial or sanction, sign of officer , dispatch date” must be printed. Such act will be useful to
track vested interest. This system will also highlight the handful of honest
employees and their honesty be reflected on paper for their duteous style of
work and also it is necessary to face the blame of inefficiency because of corrupt
ones.
Off
course several ways are there if administration and politicians keeps hands in
hand (like that currently for making corruption) to curb the corruption and to
make optimistic use of fund collected from people. The budget of BMC is Higher than 14 states
in India but still Mumbaikrs are waiting for basic facilities for over
together. Proper use of fund will
definitely turn useful to prove all the labels like “CAPITAL CITY” , “
FINANCIAL CAPITAL ”of Mumbai into reality.
Thanking
you.
Looking positively for feedback.
SUDHIR L. DANI,
9869226272 ,
Copy for information:
·
Hon. Chief
Minister, Maharashtra.
·
Hon. Mayor, BMC.
·
Secretary,
UDD, Maharashtra.
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