Cuttack, Nov. 9: A public interest litigation (PIL) filed in Orissa High Court has sought intervention for enactment of the Right to Public Services Act by the Orissa government.
Enactment of the legislation would ensure “accountability, transparency and fairness in administration at all level and delivery of due services to the people of the state,” the PIL contends.
Secretary of the Nationalist Lawyers’ Forum Nishikanta Mishra said: “Common man, in both rural and urban areas, are made to pay bribe in service delivery system at ground-level and in each step of process to get ration card, BPL card, driving licence and so on.” “However, the Orissa government has not taken effective steps to make the public servants accountable and provide timely service to the public without hassle and harassment while states such as Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab have already enacted the legislation to address the maladies,” Mishra said. The PIL is yet to be taken up by the high court.
The petition (with a copy of the legislation enacted by the Bihar government) said the act would be an effective step “to eradicate rampant corruption prevalent in the state at all levels” and ensure “delivery of notified services to the people within a stipulated time limit”.
The PIL wanted the act to make mandatory for public servants to dispose of files within fixed time and provide for penalty on failure to do so. It wanted the act to cover services among others, including health services and sanitation, drinking water, electricity, approval of social security pensions and time-bound disposal of matters related to tehsil offices such as issuance of caste certificate, domicile certificate, income certificate, approval to various social security pension, scholarship and mutation cases.
The petition stated the Orissa government had undertaken numerous social welfare schemes. But, benefits of such schemes are not reaching the targeted population in the rural areas because of “gross negligence and inaction of public servants”.
“While funds, allocated for implementation of the schemes, are being misappropriated by the public servants, no steps are being taken to eradicate such corruption,” the petition alleged.
In the past five years, 2,700 government employees have been arrested on corruption charges and of them, 447 were from Class I services and 450 belonged to Class II services.
“The corruption cases are increasing every year. But, there is no speedy trial. Thus the matters are protracted in different grounds and accused are acquitted in many cases owing to lack of evidence and non-availability of witnesses,” the petition stated.
