Public grievances on the rise because of awareness: Minister

A faulty mixie is not an issue that you'd take up with the government. But an angry customer from Telangana did just that -- and even got the appliance replaced, Union minister Jitendra Singh said today.
The minister of state for personnel, public grievances and pensions said his ministry was being flooded with complaints, with some having little to do with the government.
The National Democratic Alliance government had registered a steep rise in complaints against government departments since it came to power in 2014, he said.
"The increase in public grievances is because of people- friendly measures taken by the Modi dispensation which make people more aware of their rights," he told reporters here.

The government expects to receive 12 lakh complaints by the end of 2017. The number of public grievances was below two lakh till 2012, he said.
"The increase in grievances is also due to their prompt disposal by the government," said Singh.

The government had cut down the time taken to resolve public grievances from an average of over 253 days in 2012 to 24 days in 2017, he said.
The mixie complaint was in the pile of grievances received mainly through the Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) -- an online system for addressing plaints from the people against government departments, monitored by the ministry.

Singh said his ministry received some "unusual" complaints, such as the one registered by a man identified as T Vinod Kumar, who had trouble with his mixer-grinder bought online.
"We sent his complaint to the Ministry of Consumer Affairs and at last he got the machine replaced," he said.
About 1.75 lakh grievances were received in 2012. In 2015, 8.79 lakh public grievances were received and 7.69 lakh of them (87.53 per cent) resolved.
The ministry received 11.94 lakh public grievances last year and resolved 11.87 lakh complaints, a success rate of 99.35 per cent, he said.
So far this year, about 5.49 lakh public grievances have been received, of which 5.47 lakh have been resolved, he said. The average time for a solution was 24 days.

"Seeing the number of grievances in the first five months, we expect that the number of complaints to touch 12 lakh," he said.
Singh said he also occasionally calls up complainants to check on the status of a grievance.
A few days ago he rang a retired colonel in Punjab who had lodged a complaint relating to pension payment.
"I introduced myself as only Jitendra Singh (rather than a Union minister) and informed him about the resolution of his complaint," he said.
It was only after he had hung up that the ex-colonel realised it was the minister who had called.

"I hung up only to get a return call from the person who felt extremely elated at having received a phone call from the minster himself. It is a historic step in good governance," he said.