Bihar secretariat

Patna, Aug. 16: The Right to Public Service (RTPS) Act received a huge response on the first working day after its implementation. Around 28,500 applications were received today in different field offices.

“This is just the preliminary report, as we are still getting inputs from the districts. The number of application is likely to cross the 30,000 mark by late evening,” a senior state government officer associated with the report compilation work told The Telegraph.

He said the maximum number of applications received today were for residential certificates. Caste and income certificates were next in demand.

“We are in the process of compiling reports for applications received for different kinds of services but it would take some time to arrive at the final figures,” the officer said.

Bihar entered the RTPS Act era from August 15. But it being a public holiday, the government offices started delivering services under RTPS Act from today. Fifty services under 20 broad categories are under the ambit of the act.

“We had expected more applications related to social security pension. But the special drive of the state government to cover all the eligible persons appear to have worked well and a few applications under this head were received today,” said the officer.

Apart from applicants, a large number of people turned up at the government offices to make queries about the benefits of the act.

“Reports reaching from the districts suggest that those manning the ‘May I Help You’ desks had a busy day on Tuesday,” added the officer.

The Jigyasa Helpline set up in the state headquarters also received about 200 phone calls related to queries about the RTPS Act.

“The number of phone calls would have been higher but some of our lines were busy as we had to collect reports from the districts,” said one of the officials manning the helpline.

No major complaints on receiving applications and giving unique receipt numbers to applicants came as a relief to those keeping a tab on the implementation of the act in the state headquarters.

Sources said the number of applications and queries were likely to increase in days to come as people would come to know about the benefits of the act with the passage of time.