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‘Citizens' Report on Governance and Development 2010' released
NEW DELHI: The number of Bills passed by Parliament declined from 47 in 2008 to 41 in 2009; more than 40 lakh cases were pending in State High Courts by December 31 last year. Many such findings were released here on Tuesday in the “Citizens' Report on Governance and Development 2010” by the National Social Watch.
Source: Read More
03/15/2011
Curbing Procurement Corruption
By PRANAV BHATTARAI
Public procurement is a lucrative area for business and corruption as well. It is estimated that approximately 70 percent of the central government expenditure in every country is spent through procurement or contracts annually.
Source: Read More
03/13/2011
Automating Public Procurement
By Pranav Bhattarai
Developing countries are making efforts to modernize their procurement system with the use of web-based technologies. Many governments worldwide have adopted e-procurement as a great leap toward promoting e-government.
Source: Republica
03/03/2011
Making Procurement Socially Accountable
By Md Shafiul Alam
Public procurement, that accounts for over three billion US dollars a year, is an important area of governance in the country. Transparency, accountability, fair competition and equal treatment to all are the essence of public procurement. The use of public money in the process calls for strict adherence to the Public Procurement Act (PPA) 2006 and the Public Procurement Rules (2008).
Source: The Financial Express
01/30/2011
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Involving elected representatives in awareness campaigns
Mon, 01/03/2011 - 12:05
In countries or areas where RTI awareness levels are low, awareness campaigns are usually driven by NGO's and CBO's. Government-led initiatives are rare. One way of addressing this is to involve locally elected representatives, who are able to mobilize large numbers of people in their electorates or constituencies, to spread information. This can be done through (a) Designing/providing publicity materials to MPs to distribute in their constituencies and (b) Enlist MPs support to run RTI clinics/camps on sites or during events where large numbers of citizens converge, such as welfare card allocation. As elected representatives, these individuals are usually always keen to assist their electorates and these initiatives can be undertaken in a cost-effective way. Do you think this is an effective approach towards awareness creation? What are your experiences?
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The ideation of involving elected representatives is good. But in case of India the spirit of being transparent among the elected representatives are low and political accountability is a big question. In this situation to create awareness among the generals through mandatory provisions to the Public Information Officers is vital. This can be done through (1)'RTI Help Desk’ should be set up in each public office and hand holding support to the RTI applicants and generals should be provided by the officials in charge. (2)The duty of the PIO’s and officials in charge of RTI implementation should not limited to only acceptance of RTI application but also provide hand holding support to the applicant citizens to file a correct application with specificity of questions/information. (3)The capacity of the Public officials should be increased through extensive training.