The Jharkhand chief minister?s residence on Kanke Road. Munda plans to install closed-circuit monitors in his house and other government establishments to keep an eye on erring officials and to ensure proper and swift administration

Ranchi, Dec. 18: Chief minister Arjun Munda has a ?vision? to monitor the functioning of certain government establishments and offices through closed-circuit televisions and cameras.

Going by the adage charity begins at home, Munda has expressed his intent to install as many as eight cameras at strategic locations on his sprawling 10-acre residential campus. The move is to ensure that visitors are not ill treated, to keep an eye on the employees, and also to cater to the security aspects. The plans are still in infancy, pointed out a top chief minister?s office (CMO).

Private secretary to chief minister Tapas Mallik said: ?Sir (Munda) has a vision to monitor the functioning at certain offices through cameras. But it is still in a concept level.?

But, sources said the CMO has already started inching ahead with its plans. Moreover, they added, plans to equip closed-circuit monitors and cameras at secretariat and also in the districts offices are afoot. The move is to ensure that employees? attendance and functioning of government offices are going on without any hitches, they noted.

The government is of the opinion that the infrastructure of the ongoing Jharnet project ? which envisages a network of government offices from the block level upwards ? can be used to run the monitors and cameras. About 45,000 government offices would be linked through the Rs-100 crore Jharnet project.

Apart from these, Munda also wants to link the cameras to his personal laptop through a dedicated lease line, so that he can keep an eye no matter where he is, sources observed.

Besides, the chief minister also wants a software that can monitor the grievances received at his office and residence and can also help the public in fixing appointments with him.

The step is to ensure that the complaints received at the CMO are addressed on time, and also that an aspiring visitor to the office can have the advantages of fixing appointments with Munda through the Internet, sources said. Such a system is already up and running in many states such as Delhi and Karnataka.

But some administrative observers are wondering if the ambitious scheme will ever take off, especially given Munda?s poor track record of keeping a tab on his officials and employees through IT is concerned.

The Jharkhand chief minister information system (JCMIS), on the lines of Karnataka?s Mukhyavahini, has also failed to see the light of the day.

The Rs 1.59-crore project envisaged government departments updating information into the JCMIS, thus making it easily and swiftly accessible to the chief minister. The idea was to make it easier to track and manage files and schemes pending at the headquarters.

Another such ambitious-but-failed design, by Munda, was to have a line of communication with his secretaries. The chief minister had also wanted all politicians? correspondence, to him, acknowledged and replied with the current status of the subject concerned.