MP govt launches 'M-Governance' for grievance redressal

Platform will initially operate as a call centre and later mobile application version will also be launched

To bring government closer to commoner and remove drudgery of maintaining huge amount of complaints related documents Madhya Pradesh government today introduced its "M-Governance" platform.

Introduced with private partnership, the platform will enable a commoner to narrate his grievances that requires government intervention. Interestingly this new "M-governance" facility would also entertain complaints pertaining to corruption and irregularities, particularly when the state chief minister and his family already are facing charges of corruption and irregularities in a multi-crore entrance exam scam.

Soon a mobile application version of this platform will also be launched.

Christened as "Janhetu-Jansetu" the platform, in the shape of a call center, will remain open till late night through a designated number "181" on which a commoner can tell his grievances. Once registered the call center executive forwards the grievances to concerned officer. Any citizen of the state can also seek information regarding government schemes and can know about his entitlement for the same, besides exposing corruption.

"It is practically difficult to manage those hundreds of papers which I receive from common people during my public meetings. It certainly means some problem persists in our government machinery at delivery level, which is why I decided to use technology and provide a common platform to public. As everyone, even labours, use mobile phones these days a mobile-compatible platform has been chosen," Shivraj Singh Chouhan state chief minister said here today.

There are four levels of grievance redressal mechanism in this platform, the last one is chief secretary or the chief minister. If one level fails to address the grievance in stipulated time of seven days it is automatically escalated to the next level. The complaint would be treated open if the commoner is not satisfied.

"Earlier too we tried to bridge the gap between governance and commoner through our "Samadhan Online" system in which I used to bring the concerned officer and complaint closer and redress his grievance instantly but we needed a wider platform. However, it is a big challenge for us. It would be a tough task to listen to everyone, sort out the grievance, categorise it, address it and satisfy each and every one," Chouhan said.

This 'M-governance' initiative was on trial for the last few months. During this period a total of 1.2 million calls poured in from across the state. "Of them 64 per cent sought information regarding various schemes run by state government," Hariranjan Rao, a senior civil servant who played a key-role in this initiative. The most important and interesting part in the complaint against government staff and officials lies in its redressal mechanism. "Complaints against government staff and officers at lower level will require identity of the complainant, however, against senior officials and civil servants the identity of the complainant will be concealed if he wants to do so."