Politics of Good

Hailing from a rural village Annadanam in the Nalgonda district of Telangana, Uma (28) was very passionate to be a part of Politics. Though she is well educated and worked extensively in the social sector for a decade, she couldn't find a way to the active politics as she hardly had any support and guidance.  Meenakshi (24) from Delhi is running an NGO for education and social development, wants to be a politician and to become a minister, again clueless having experienced the dearth of platforms handholding her dream. However, there was a paradigm shift in the pathways of people like Uma and Menakshi after "She Represents'' - a seven day immersive programme hosted by a Delhi based political leadership development organization Indian School of Democracy (ISD).

Politics is good but we have less politics of good, so we feel politics is dirty. The feeling of politics is dirty, makes it more dirty and keeps good people at bay. In a February 2020 judgement the supreme court asked the political parties  to  specify why other individuals without criminal antecedents could not be selected as candidates. In 2019 as many as 43% of MPs had criminal cases pending against them. A very recent report by Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR) finds that 24% of Rajya sabha members face criminal cases. The analysis also found that 203 of the 229 MPs or 89% of those analysed had declared assets over ₹1crore. The nexus of corruption and politics is also a pressing concern. Does it mean that politics is only for corrupted, criminals and affluent people ? Would it be a hindrance to attract people with integrity and commitment to be a part of the political process in this country ?. Answers to this question remains elusive.

Nevertheless, we have sprouts of hope.  Indian School of Democracy (ISD) a budding organization founded by two young visionaries is one in such direction. Aiming high to build a community of principled public leaders, working to make India a global inspiration for inclusive democracy; Hemakshi Meghani graduated from the Harvard Kennedy School in public policy and Prakahr Bhartiya completed his masters in public administration from Columbia University are in a daring pursuit.  After successfully organizing Democracy Express and She Represents- a week long programme introducing youth to different pathways to politics and building a community of future principled leaders, Indian School of Democracy is venturing into an year long programme. After seven decades of independence, we are not at a stage to say that our democracy is working for all. As we reflect, one of the many reasons is the dearth of principled leadership in public service. Today, India needs its best hearts and heads to serve, and nurture them as a cadre of enterprising and moral public servants. Says Prakhar Bhartiya, one of the founders.  Hemakshi, co-founder of ISD believes that every generation needs its own leaders and our generation is struggling to find principled leaders in the public and political landscape. Today, a lot of motivated and talented young leaders often do not choose the path of public service. We need to bring a change.

The recently concluded She Represents exudes confidence among the young team at ISD. “I have learnt that age doesn't define wisdom, I have got the reaffirmation that "naive optimism" is the way to go forward, I have learnt that the present policy work I do is only as effective as the results on ground lest it will only be a badge on my CV”; Spurti, one of the participants of She Represents shares her experiences. Uma says it's her life changing journey with ISD, Meenakshi undoubtedly decided to choose his tryst with politics, and Reeta wants to contribute more to his native community. Many more young people resolved to pursue their passion for national development through politics.

The notion of politics is dirty anyhow to be changed and the need of this hour is to create principal leaders who can color the tapestry of democracy with vision, commitment and values

The Delhi Covid Story

"When antigen test is supposed to use only in containment zones and to be repeated with RTPCR test, Delhi governments strategy of heavily resorting to antigen tests without conducting subsequent RTPCR tests may undermine the containment strategy. The serological survey result estimated around 50 lakhs are infected when only 1.3 lakhs are confirmed positive using the RTPCR tests, is making lives of 77% of Delhites vulnerable to covid. It calls for revisiting the method of testing to contain the pandemic effective."

The fatality rate is the lowest in the world and the news of sudden flattening of the curve is offering lots of space for complacency to Delhiites. Undoubtedly the Delhi-Delhi duo is behind this magic and Delhi is best in the country with respect to the covid containment strategy. Imagine, we are admitted in a hospital and an avaricious or naive doctor says that an immediate surgery is required to save our life. Very likely, we will give a green signal to save our life as we are unaware about our condition and presuming that we are in threat. Later, we realized that nothing was serious. This is an unresolved dilemma in the health sector.

Testing Strategy 

Data is the oil of the era and a single data point can make a huge impact among millions, as many decisions are hovering around this which is applicable to covid strategy of test, treat and track as well. 

There are two types of covid test, RT-PCR/Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (Viral) and Rapid Antigen Detection Tests (RADT) or antigen test. Antigen tests are very fast but RT-PCR test is longer and complex. The antigen test hints the possibility of infection by finding the presence of viral proteins , but its absence does not mean the person is not infected, hence ICMR and other agencies cautioned to limit this antigen test only in containment zones or high spread regions and to do RT-PCR followed by antigen test, whereas the RT-PCR test looks for the RNA of the virus and its results are mostly accurate and reliable. Despite these facts, Delhi Government hugely resort to antigen tests (75%) and conduct tests at random places which may derail the containment strategy. 

Delhi was at the peak during the end of June which sharply dwindled after. As per the report by the Hindu, Delhi formally began using antigen testing kits on June 18 and has accelerated their use since July. From June 18- July 16, Delhi has conducted 305,820 antigen tests, Of these, 285,225 tests came ‘negative’. Of them, 1,670 (1/200 or about 0.5%) were chosen for re-test by RT-PCR and 262 of these were confirmed positive. However, of those re-tested with RT-PCR, around 15% test positive, which is higher than the antigen test positivity of 6%;report says. It's alarming as the testing strategy is more relied on less unreliable antigen tests ( Affidavit by Delhi Government says 2-3 antigen test for one RT-PCR ) when antigen tests are limited to high risk zones only as  it may miss as many as half of those who are actually positive. That is, if antigen tests account for most of Delhi's increased testing rates, they may be missing a lot of cases, driving the case numbers down. 

In fact, India's current testing guidelines require that anyone who tests negative for the virus must be retested with an RT-PCR kit. So the question is how many tests of each kind is Delhi doing, and is everyone being retested? Asks K Srinath Reddy, president of the Public Health Foundation of India and member of the national Covid-19 taskforce. This is very misleading in the context of nearly 90% covid cases are asymptomatic. 

50 Lakhs infected ? 

The serological survey conducted in Delhi assumed that around 23 per cent (around 50 lakhs) which means as many as one in every four Delhi citizens have already been exposed to the virus. This result is surpassing the possibility of infection (15%) as per the random antigen tests. When the total number of confirmed positive cases in Delhi so far is around 1.3 lakhs and the probability of infected as per the serological survey is around fifty lakhs, this is a healthy emergency as 77% are vulnerable to the virus. It also revealed that a PCR test caught only about 1 in 50 who are infected by the virus. This undermines claims by the Delhi government of its ability to contain infection spread. The Hindu reported.

COVID Challenges - ACT

The COVID crisis is ever growing ! It becomes unaffordable for locked down people, migrant labourers, and to an extend to governments. The fight is now literally shifted between virus and hunger. Millions of migrant labours are stranded at various places and a large number of daily wage earners are miffed with the means of food. How long government and NGOs can reach to the needy, it's practically challenging. How much we can witness the heart breaking pains of human faces.

Though risky, steps are inevitable to bring back migrant labours to their home states before loosing their patience as it's a matter of survival.

Government shall think of organized shifting of people to their home towns through special trains/buses after required health check ups in controlled manner keeping the mandates of social distancing in practice. Hence people can atleast take care of their food and stay with their own dear ones. It will reduce the burden of hunger relief efforts and grievances redressals of government amidst challenges to maintain social distancing at hunger relief camps/centers. At last, it's a fight between virus and hunger and we may not be able to test the patience of people striving to find a something to feed themselves.

The scenario looks a long lasting persistence. State governments are supposed face the concerns of labour shortages especially in construction sector as an aftermath of migrants retur. It's the time to create a brigade of skilled workers where deficit and demand see. Plans have to be chalked out to mitigate the manpower shortage by badging and branding of new plumbers, electricians, construction assistants, masons, agricultural practitioners etc based on requirements. Agencies like ASAP Kerala can truly and rightly pitch into the mitigation activities. This is in need as the entire rural economy is engulfed by liquidity crunch.

1. Offering Skill Training to people based on demands on geographical basis.

2. Branding and make them organized even through skills on call like Urban Clappers

3. Make mandatory the police clearance before enrolling to the pool.

4. Their is a high chance of infiltres and criminals in the migrant workforce, hence individual employers shall have the responsibility to keep the valid IDs and police clearance certificates. Monitoring divisions have to have a clear watch on this.

5. Minimum wages shall be strictly paid to migrant labours.Working conditions and accommodations of migrant labours shall be well maintained with all the required facilities. This will be enforced to contracters inorder to avoid exploitation, risking lives of people, unhygienic living styles and to discourage people to over relay on external work forces.

The constitution offers the free movement of citizens across the country, however it becomes impossible to live up to our fundamental rights owing to the prevailing crisis.

Time has exceed to awake, plan and implement.

Let's together prepare to face the post covid challenges

Government at the doorstep of citizens

Government at the doorstep of citizens 
The public sector is regarded as the world’s largest service provider. It is a fact that efficiency of governments is no longer measured in terms of revenue it generates but it’s efficiency in delivering various services. However improvements in public service delivery are also reflected in the GDP of the country as well. Making the service delivery hassle free to citizens through transparent, affordable, and accountable manner shall be the core agenda of governments.  This requires developing technology enabled customer-centric models in par with private sector which are putting citizens at the heart of service delivery design. It was in this realization government of Delhi has initiated an innovative scheme known as the doorstep delivery of public services which is a first of the kind in the country. The main purpose of the scheme is to improve transparency, accountability, and responsiveness of the government and to add inclusiveness in the public service delivery system by ensuring equitable access to disadvantaged sections especially women, scheduled categories, and the poor. 

How it works 
The doorstep delivery of public services programme is designed in a way that people can avail various government services at their doorsteps doing away from visiting offices, approaching touts/intermediaries, and  get rid from bribing officers. This is a great relief to common public as they don’t want to be in the brave snaking queues or taking leave from their work for getting their services done from government. They just want to book their appointment for the government representative through the 24x7 call centre number 1076, online or any of the designated government offices.  Government representative called ‘mobile sahayak’ will visit their doorsteps during their preferred slots between 7.00 A.M to 10.00 PM.  Now the applicants can handover the required document to the mobile sahayak for further processing. The services will be get delivered in fifteen days. The scheme now covers seventy services from twelve departments including all services from revenue and transport department like caste certificate, income, domicile and marriage certificates, new water connections, driving license, vehicle registration, scholarships, pensions etc. Applicants have to appear before the officer in certain services like driving licence and marriage registration where physical presence is mandatory. Citizens will be charged with a nominal amount of fifty rupees as facilitation charges which is subsidized by the government. 

No visit no queue no touts 
The scheme is historic in various ways. Earlier citizens had to spend a huge amount of time and money including for travelling to avail certain government services. The opportunity costs involved like availing off or loosing livelihood are also need to be considered. Apart from this, the extra fees they had to incur for computer centre charges, informal intermediaries, bribes etc. It is revealed that an average of four times an applicant had to visit offices for getting their services delivered and to spend thousands if touts are involved. This exploitation was basically due to the lack of knowledge and unfamiliarity towards technical terms and low digital literacy.  Once the full fledged call centre and mobile sahayayaks were in place such concerns become weeded out   and the scheme emerged as a one stop solution for government services. The doorstep scheme brought a grinding halt to tentacles of touts and eventually corruption. Presence of touts sharply reduced after the launch of the programme as citizen has easy access to the government services at very reasonable cost. 

Accountability and transparency 
The department of the administrative reforms and public grievances, GOI has provided a systematic approach to improving public services which are applicable to all the central and state governments known as the Sevottam framework (Indian Standard IS: 15700: 2005). In order adhere to the principles the doorstep service scheme also incorporated the citizen charter, grievance redresses system, and service delivery standards.  Timely delivery of services is always a paramount concern of the public. Delhi is one of the states where right to time bound services is assured. Compared to other windows the doorstep scheme is maintaining a minimum SLA period (deadline for delivering the service) of fifteen days for all services where as the former was exceeding thirteen days in many cases. The same is subjected to the scrutiny of public as it comes under the ambit of right to information act. Furthermore applicant can view the real time status of their application through online or from call centre. As per the e-SLA rule respective officers are also liable for penalization in case of breaching of SLA.  It is also crucial to have a strong system of redress of public grievances which incorporated in the scheme. During the last one year Delhi government has disposed on 2.15 lakh requests, completing around 99.5% of the services booked. Receiving around 13.69 lakh calls, the call centre became an information disseminator in public service delivery. 

A good public private partnership model 
The scheme is also an emulating model in public private partnership as the front end operations and technical supports are outsourced to an external agency through a competitive bidding process. Being domain expertise and experience, technical strength, and financial propositions were the prime criteria for selecting the agency, it enabled the smooth functioning of the programme. It also improved the performance and process of public service delivery aided by technology. Within a short span of time the doorstep delivery scheme evolved as an excellent public service design in government. 

The doorstep service delivery scheme has made a paradigm shift in citizen-centric governance approach being an instrument of empowering citizens. The biggest challenge faced in public service delivery was of lack of awareness among the public and effective vertical and horizontal convergence of institutions. Being a new initiative in the governance it takes time to percolate to public. The task of sensitizing people to get rid from the concerns regarding procedural ambiguity, patterns followed for a long time for availing public services, and misinformation by intermediaries was huge. Our government is in a pursuit of massive awareness mode to empower citizens to sensitize about their rights.   It was equally important the continuous capacity building and consultations among government officials to build trust and cooperation. Government is now moving ahead with plan of making doorstep the single window for all kind of public services to make sure that citizen is at the centre of governance.

Life and Campus @ JNU

Jawaharlal Nehru University was established in 1969 by an act of parliament.[7] It was named after Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first Prime Minister. G. Parthsarthi was the first vice-chancellor.[8] Prof. Moonis Raza was the Founder Chairman and Rector.[9][10] The bill for the establishment of Jawaharlal Nehru University was placed in the Rajya Sabha on 1 September 1965 by the then minister of education, M. C. Chagla. During the discussion that followed, Bhushan Gupta, member of parliament, voiced the opinion that this should not be yet another university. New faculties should be created, including scientific socialism, and one thing that this university should ensure was to keep noble ideas in mind and provide accessibility to students from weaker sections of society. The JNU Bill was passed in Lok Sabha on 16 November 1966 and the JNU Act came into force on 22 April 1969.[11] The Indian School of International Studies was merged with the Jawaharlal Nehru University in June 1970. Following the merger, the prefix "Indian" was dropped from the name of the School and it became the School of International Studies of the Jawaharlal Nehru University.[12]