Ten News Noida Citizen-Administration Dialogue : Col P Chandra (Retd.) Shares Views
TENNEWS NOIDA
The services provided by government are deteriorating day by day. Central and State
Governments have numerous departments headed by IAS, IPS and State Cadre Officers. The
governments spend tens of thousands of crores on their salary and perks. Thousands of crores
are allotted to different departments to improve civic amenities for citizens. But after creating
such huge departments and after spending such huge budget things are not changing for
better. It appears that our government and our elected representatives have abdicated their
collective responsibilities. The bureaucracy (which is not known for efficiency and inclusiveness)
has taken over. The citizen is nowhere in picture. This is a road to nowhere and recipe for
disaster.
Both rich, middle class and poor remain unsatisfied and frustrated with the performance of the
government (read government departments). Those of us who can afford it have detached
themselves from services offered by government departments, wherever they can. For example
we send our children to private schools because government schools remain in bad condition
despite pouring in huge amounts of public money. Even poor people are avoiding government
schools. Those who can afford it have formed gated compounds and have their own security,
generators, RO System, water supply system and own transport. Most of us avail of private
health care system instead of going to government hospitals. All of us are trying to find our own
solutions to different problems facing us.
A modern nation or state is supposed to provide some essential services to its citizens. But the
quality of public services is on the decline. There are millions of people who cannot bypass the
services provided by the state government. For example law & order, roads, air which we are
breathing, badly planned civic services, open & overflowing drains, poor quality of water &
sanitation etc. The list is long.
It is not that we are not paying taxes. But our taxpayer funded systems (for example health and
education system) are of such poor quality that the tax payer pays additional money and goes
to private schools and hospitals to avail of good services, though he has paid for creation of
government hospitals and government schools.
The government and government departments are under no pressure to deliver high quality of
public services despite collecting taxes from its citizens. Every government employee is paid
from money collected as taxes. But they do not feel any obligation to deliver consistently high
quality of services to citizens. There is great mismatch between citizen’s expectation and
service delivery by Noida Authority and other government departments. The poor performance
of government departments is a great leveler. No matter how rich or poor you are you have to
breathe same foul and polluted air. No matter whether you are driving a motorcycle or a BMW
you have to face the same traffic jam and bad roads. After attending the TenNews Noida
sponsored meeting on 11 November 2017 it now appears that Noida Authority has not heard
about social democracy. It appears that they are looking for ways of exiting from the
responsibility of providing public services of high standard.
Ours is a representative democracy. But our elected representatives are now mute spectators.
The dialog is one sided with citizen’s voice muted. The long term vision and plan of Noida
Authority (with timelines and accountability) is not known to the urban and rural citizens of
Noida. Citizens are never invited to participate while planning short term and long term needs.
This has given rise to various lobbies which try to address their pain points.
To conclude I want to say that high standard of public goods and services are a must for
development of Noida. No one can escape the consequences of delivery of poor or inadequate
standard of public goods and services. Both poor and rich will be affected. The citizens will be
affected, the elected representatives will be affected and finally the government will also be
affected. Only the government servants will not be affected. They will continue to receive their
salary and perks.
So the people of Noida have a right to speak up to convey their message loud and clear. I urge
all people and organizations (like FONRWA, CONRWA) to develop a vision for Noida. All of us
need to come together. We need to bring strong public pressure on Noida Authority and our
elected representatives to get serious about resolving issues of Noida.
