People, Politics and Government

Why Business Corporations under Governments in India are Ailing

2012-01-27T01:37:00.000+05:30

I consider myself a consumer aware of his rights and responsibilities, so keep on providing my feedback to products and services I often use and find them deficient in some desired features. With this, I find a great contrast in responses from government-owned business organizations and those under private ownership. These differences throw light on why business organizations under government control are generally ailing and failing as really business organizations.

Officials Allergic to Feedback and Complaints

While private business organizations respond quickly to the feedbacks they receive from their customers to know their deficiencies and improve upon them, the government business organizations avoid responding to feedbacks and consider the feedbacks as disturbances to their functioning with all officials concerned finding ways to ignore, block and blackout feedback from their customers. This tendency, deeply engrained in minds of those working for government organizations, is blocking the organizations from improving to have the spirit of enterprising, like that of private organizations.

Officials of government organizations fair worst in dealing with complaints and take these as personal insults with tendencies of taking revenge from the complaining customers. When I complained to various officials of BSNL (M/s Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited), a Government of India undertaking in the business of telecommunications and my Internet Service Provider, for the deteriorating Internet connectivity available to me, firstly they ignored my complaints, then they responded by sending unskilled and untrained laborers, temporarily employed by them for attending to customer services, to me for dealing with a highly technological problem that was continuing for months, while Engineers supposed to deal with such problems sitting in their posh offices with no interest in customer problems. When I wrote some articles on the problems I have been facing, my Internet connectivity is intentionally blocked to teach me a lesson.

A U.P. government undertaking UPPCL (M/s U.P. Power Corporation Limited) and its subsidiaries, responsible for electricity supply in my area has been miserably failing in supplying electricity even as per roster set by them-selves. I have been writing to various officials on this for the last 10 years with no considerable results so far. Now, they have learnt to blackout my complaints to them.

The Official Air of Authority

Constitution of India is derived from British constitution of days when the Sun used to never set in the British Empire spread all over the globe. That constitution provided unbridles powers to administrators of British colonial subjects, the same powers are being enjoyed by even the present administrators of India, while they are supposed to be the public servants. The officials of business organizations under governments consider themselves as step brothers of the said administrators of the country and hence have the same air of authority while dealing with their customers from public.

While even a top-notch Engineer of private business organization remains on his/her toes to attend to problems under his/her jurisdiction without caring for his/her status and staining his/her clothes, even a middle-level official of a government undertaking moves in the area under his/her jurisdiction with a horde of attendants ever-ready to serve his whims.

No Measure of Performance Parameters

Government business organizations meant for providing their services to public choose to operate as a monopoly in the field and manage to have that through government. These organizations have only one parameter to measure their performance – revenue collected from people, they are supposed to serve, which they collect by hook or crook, from the helpless public through using their unbridled authority with many unilateral provisions in rule and regulations for their imposition on people. Customer satisfaction is nobody’s business as asserted by private organizations. Even this revenue is not related to how much they spend on earning this, and hence the profitability of the organization. So, a great share of this revenue is pocketed by the officials themselves through corrupt practices, they are apt at.

The revenue officially received by UPPCL corresponds to only 30 percent of electricity handled by the corporation, with no will in officialdom to improve upon. A bulk of this electricity goes to thefts with a major portion of it to the pockets of the officials.

BSNL encourages their customers to pay anticipated charges for the coming 1, 2 or three years in advance instead of paying their monthly bills. If a customer discontinues his/her connectivity through an account with advance payment, all the balance amount due is forfeited by BSNL as their just revenue. The amount of billing is under full control of the organization with only very hesitant information to the customers.

For the customers to know their Internet usage, BSNL has a self-care portal for the purpose. I registered myself with that portal, with an automatic response in a week providing to me a password for logging in. When I tried login through the given credentials, the site refused to recognize the credentials and refused a login. While I got stuck-up in this jargon, officials feel free from any responsibility of providing me the desired information.

An Obligation on People

Like all government officials, officials of business organizations under government have secured jobs for full durations their respective active lives just by their entry into the employment. Therefore, all salaries, facilities and perks out of the employment become their birthrights with no responsibilities and accountabilities towards customers of the organizations they are enrolled with as employees. Therefore, even their coming to respective offices is an obligation on people needing their services and assistances. I have rarely found any such official reaching his/her office in time, and staying there until the end of duty time. Persons who can not attend their workplaces punctually have no interest in their jobs.

There was a Commercial Officer of BSNL at Bulandshahr about 2 years back who was running a business of BSNL franchisee and used to come to his office countable in minutes, and there too he used to be busy on telephone with his own business matters. Soon, he was rewarded with a promotion and was posted elsewhere. Then SUB Divisional Engineer of BSNL used to come to his Jahangirabad telephone exchange office occasionally only as a guest of other employees working in the exchange.

In a surprise check by a new enthusiastic district magistrate, the Executive Engineer responsible for Electricity Distribution in my area was found missing until 11:30 am. On getting information of checking from his colleagues, he rushed to the office.

It is not that these officials don’t understand meaning and significance of loyalty, they very well have it for their superior officials in providing them with personalized services and in return, get protection of employment with freedom from attendances in their respective offices.

Thus, officials of business organizations under government in fields of public services keep on making the organization and the people to suffer with gains for themselves. Unless the above-said tendencies are changed to like those of private enterprises, the organizations shall remain ailing and failing in their officially-stated objectives.

BSNL must close down its shop or dismiss all their present Engineers holding official positions

2012-01-20T13:06:00.000+05:30

Unfortunately, I live in rural India where Internet connectivity is monopolized by BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited) a government of India undertaking. My broadband connectivity provided by BSNL is often disrupted for hours or days continuously, with nobody in the organization except the temporarily employed laborers who attend to customer problems with their limited education and knowledge and no guidance from the so-called Engineers of BSNL. The problem continues for many months now with no foreseeable solution with the present setup of the ISP.

In the organization, although all key positions are held by Engineers, but none of these so-called Engineers works as an Engineer with realization of his/her duties and responsibilities towards customers and is willing to work. They just exist in their respective positions to suck blood of poor people of India in terms of hefty pay packets they get every month. The Internet connectivity often fails for hours or even days with no body to listen to complaints of this type.

Firstly, the officials don’t pick up calls from customers on their official mobile phones, considering these as their perks, not as a tool for better communicability. If they pick up, they simply redirect the complainant to somebody else instead of taking interest by themselves as their duty and responsibility.

198 Service

Officials often ask to book the complaint on 198 service which never works. I keep on trying it but never got successful in booking my complaint. Therefore, it is just a way of the officials for keeping the customers involved in this nonfunctional service to get rid of themselves. The multiple selectivity options provided in booking a complaint never work.

Customer Self-care Portal

BSNL has a provision for customers for finding their Internet usage, billing and online payment etc. for which separate registration is required. I registered myself for the service and was informed that a password would be sent to me. Yes, I got the password after a week but to my shock, I don’t get access to the website using my username and password with the message that the password does not match. Since, this password service is automated, there is no provision of taking the password failure back to BSNL. Thus, even this service is of no value to the customers.

My Experiences with BSNL

Being An Engineer myself, with reaching the level of Chief Engineer through working in various industrial units, I never came across with Engineers like those of BSNL who just work as head clerks, or at the most Officers, but never as Engineers. To me, an Engineer is always there to look at technological matters related to his/her job, but BSNL Engineers consider this as an insult to their high positions with high pay-packets. For everything regarding customer services, they just rely on temporarily employed almost uneducated laborers getting monthly payment of Rs 1,500 only from the BSNL, that is even lower than that specified in the Minimum Wages Act of the country.

The only reason for apathy of BSNL officers towards customer problems is because they are in government employment having job security. So, they work like all other government employees in the country irrespective of the fact that they are part of a business operation run by the government.

Articles and Essays: (Miss)Deeds to Misdeeds of Maya

2012-01-12T02:36:00.000+05:30

Articles and Essays: (Miss)Deeds to Misdeeds of Maya

Overpaid Government Employees in India are Problems for People

2012-01-08T11:24:00.000+05:30

Overpaid Government Employees in India are Problems for People:

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The Gravest Problem of India : Overpopulation

2012-01-08T06:34:00.000+05:30

More than 17 percent of world population is living on a piece of land, called India, that is less than 3 percent of the world land area. India stands second in terms of population after China but India's population density is more than 2.5 times that of China. While China has effectively controlled her population growth and devoted her population to productivity, in India there not yet any move to control population or make productive use of it. Thus, disaster in inevitable for India through population explosion coupled with wide-spread unemployment.

Every individual needs food first to survive which becomes in short supply when a country gets overpopulated. All other developments take a backseat with the whole nation getting worried for filling hungry bellies. Same is the situation at family level when everyone seems to be worried for getting food instead of any other development. This is where India stands today. In-spite of comfortable food-grain production and stocks in the country, faces of Indians don't look up for developments for their worries of getting two ends meet.

Medical science has done a wonderful job in curbing deaths at times of births, in school days due to small pox, malaria, etc. and epidemic deaths in huge numbers which used to grip India about 50 years back. This has added to population growth as birth rate has not diminished much. Providing longevity to the population is one aspect of health while keeping the population healthy is another. Having the first without the second creates more problems than solving them. India is in such a problematic state having more mouths to feed with less number of productive hands.

Another reason of severity of the overpopulation problem rises with higher population growth rate in poor and illiterate sections of the society who can not afford to provide adequate healthcare and education to their children. Comparatively, richer sections produce less children and educate their children well. This differentiation has widened income disparities leading to more crimes in the society.

The population problem of India has given rise to many other socioeconomic problems in the country which I would like to discuss here one by one.

Poverty and Sickness

Since independence of India in 1947, governments have trying to bridge socioeconomic disparities in the society through welfare schemes rather than through education and creating employment opportunities to the people. As a result, a huge population in the country finds it comfortable in remaining poor and uneducated for getting free doles from the government. These poor people get little medical care and hence are mostly sick. Finding a totally disease-free person in Indian society is a rare thing with poor sick for poverty and the rich sick for their effluence. Sicknesses need more funds for health services and reduce overall productivity of the people hence deficiency in revenue generation. Thus, India is in a vicious cycle with respect to poverty and sicknesses.

Education and Employment

For any social upheaval, education to all is a must and for providing equal opportunities to all citizens, education should be freely available to all without any discrimination. Under-utilization of workforce for lack of productive investment in the country creates shortage of funds for education, industrialization and hence creating unemployment problem leading to further under-utilization of the population. Now, for any single vacancy there are thousands of aspirants competing with each other leading to disappointments and demoralization of youths of the country.

Commercialization professional education by governments in India has divided the society in to two well demarcated sections of educated and uneducated leading to socioeconomic and law and order problems in the country.

Crime and Justice

More than 25 million litigation cases are pending in Indian courts with each case continuing for lifetimes of the litigants. This has sent a clear message to the people that timely punishment to the criminals is impossible leading to more crimes in the society. Respect to humanity and goodness have become things of the past generations of the country.

This situation has its roots in overpopulation of the country with huge numbers competing and fighting for the limited resources with intentions of the poor to survive and of the rich to grab for the future generations. In this race, the resourceful win through corrupt practices leading to more income disparities and hence crimes.

Economy and Productivity

Burdens of education, health and judicial services on the public funds are so huge that nothing is left for investing on developments and creating employment opportunities in the country to make people productive. As a result, Indian markets are flooded with foreign products which only 15 percent rich people of Indian population can afford. Rest of the population is suffering under illiteracy, unemployment, poverty and deprivations and living at sub-human levels of filth and diseases.

With tremendous growth of only 15 percent of Indian population that make a huge market for foreign brands, India is projected as growing economically while, in fact, she is sliding downhill at a fast pace in terms of overall population of the country.

Corruption and Mismanagement

Poor, uneducated, unemployed masses have no voice of their own to protest against injustice to them and mismanagement of the country's affairs by those in power through their huge-scale corrupt practices. Therefore poverty and unemployment thrive on one side while corruption goes unabated on the other side. Over the years, ruling politicians of the country have learned of benefits of poverty and unemployment of masses to them and they keep on promoting these negative assets of the masses instead of eliminating them. This is resulted failure of all democratic institutions and regulations in the country with everything becoming manageable for the ruling classes of the country. Democracy is a total farce in India.

Infrastructure and Quality of Life

Taking 4 hours to travel a distance of 40 kilometers from my village to the district head-quarters is an example how every Indian is suffering from in different ways. Traffic jams on the state highway in towns of Sikandrabad (district Bulandshahr) and Dadri (district Ghaziabad) have been going on unabated for over 20 years with major traffic abandoning the route for longer less congested ones, and the whole administration is a mute spectator of the happenings. I have already said about pending litigation cases in Indian courts making respectful living of any citizen a great wonder of the times. Electricity, considered to be essential for modern living by the civilized society all over the world, is available for 6 hours a day in the rural areas of Uttar Pradesh where telephone lines and Internet connectivity remain often down for days every now and then.

All such things decide quality of life an average Indian is forced to live with instead of his best intentions of leading life in a disciplined way. And surely, all this is the product of overpopulation for which both the people and government of the country are responsible.

Unilateral Rules and Regulations of Government-owned Corporations in India

2012-01-05T17:32:00.001+05:30

In my routine life, I am forced by my circumstances to deal with two government-owned corporations – M/s Pashchimanchal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam Limited (PVVNL) for getting electricity and M/s Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) for getting Internet connectivity. As far as my rural location is concerned, both have monopoly in their respective fields and I have no other option available to me.

PVVNL is owned by government of Uttar Pradesh – the most corrupt and the worst governed state of India while BSNL is an undertaking of government of India – must be the most corrupt and the worst governed nation of the world. Still, both the state as well the nation are not inducing any revolt by the people for principally two reasons – fertile land that feeds a great majority of hungry bellies, and complacency of people for their remaining under foreign rules for nearly 1,600 years. These factors are taken undue advantage of by political and administrative leadership of the country in dealing with problems of people as suits them.

Electricity in U.P.

I have written down on almost all aspects of problem of electricity supply in the state and sent hundreds of complaints to various authorities with requests and suggestions for improvements in the last 10 years of my living in my native village Khandoi in the state, but with no effect on any one. As a result, the condition of electricity supply is precarious and the officials concerned from the top to field level have no interest in improving the condition for which they need to maintain the system properly as expected from them. The sole purpose of each official is to earn maximum through squeezing out suffering consumers of electricity.

Internet Service in Rural India

On a average, internet connectivity remains down for a day in each week with a standard pre-recorded message on the telephone, “All lines on this route are out of order, please try after some time.” And this continues not for hours but for days at a stretch. Poor customers like me have no option but to keep on trying every half an hour whether the connectivity is ok or not. For this too, I have been complaining to various levels of officials but with no effect on their lethargic working.

The Unilateral Discipline

Even with extremely poor electricity supply and communication service, both the corporations have framed their rules and regulations to enforce very strict discipline on consumers/customers regarding payment of bills at the fixed timings prescribed by them, failing which the consumers/customers are instantly penalized. But for the deficiency in service, there is no penalty on the officials or the corporations. Such a unilateral penalizing goes on for the corporations enjoying monopolies in their respective fields.

As teeth of elephants, there are consumer protection courts working in the country for the last 30 years or so which are supposed to deliver justice to consumers with 3 months of filing a complaint with them. But, in a appeal by me to a state-level consumer court, I was informed of the first hearing after a lapse of 12 years. Even at district levels, cases remain pending for years with adjournments after adjournments on various pretexts. So, the consumers/customers have nowhere to go or complain about.

Credit facility to Indian Farmers

2011-12-31T01:49:00.000+05:30

Agriculture is a means of living for about 70 percent of Indian people as their family tradition. Every moment, a lot of persons leave agricultural fields to find their livelihoods elsewhere but there are no new persons entering the field of agriculture for their livelihoods. So, agriculture in India is not a business but a family culture for the huge population of the country.

Most essential commodities needed by humanity, such as food grains, cotton, sugar, fruits and vegetables, etc are produced through agriculture, while the industries supply the non-essential commodities to humanity. Therefore, agriculture must be given the top priority in the nation’s economy and plans. In these measures, the crucial consideration must be to ensure profitability of farmers for their work in agricultural fields.

The condition of farmers in India has always been from-hand-to-mouth even in independent India since 1947 for two reasons –

1. Prices of agricultural produce is closely monitored and controlled by the governments in the name of availability of essential commodities to common people of India forgetting that common people of the country are these farmers and agricultural labourers who get adversely affected by these price regulations. Thus, in effect, regulation of agricultural produces provides benefits to urban population who are businesspersons, government employees and other rich classes of the Indian population with cost to the poor farmers and agricultural labourers.

2. There is no control on prices of industrial products that include even agricultural inputs such as chemical fertilizers, agro-chemicals, etc. Even advanced seeds of food-grains are produced by industrial business organizations with no price regulations by the governments. The industries keep a close watch on income of farmers and keep on escalating their prices to squeeze out the farmers of their meagre incomes.

For these reasons, Indian farming community has always been under debts of money lenders spread all over the country in villages and townships. The governments in India to provide relief to the farming community from money lenders opened their banks to provide credit facilities at low rates of interest to Indian farmers under Krishi Card Scheme. Under this scheme, most of the farmers are getting money from banks which gets misspent by them in superfluous expenses such as housing buildings, marriage functions, liquor consumption, electioneering, etc adding to sufferings of the farming community instead of providing any relief to them. Only a few farmers get really benefitted by the credit scheme.

Now, almost all farmers remain indebted to banks all the time of the year. Still their incomes from agriculture remains meagre and on many occasions negative. I cite one example for proving this. Last year, paddy prices ranged around Rs 3,000 a quintal when the farmers’ paddy crop reached the market. The farmers felt very happy at this high price for their produce. Enthused with the high prices, they cultivated paddy with more of agricultural inputs for easy credit from the banks. Firstly, the harvest was not that good, secondly, the prices of paddy in the market remained below Rs 1,500 for a quintal. Thus, with more inputs to the crop, the prices remained at about half of those of the last year, causing huge losses to paddy producers. Such things add to indebtedness of farmers.

Instead of extending credit facilities to farmers, the governments must have ensured profitability of farmers to make them self-sustaining with their family work of agriculture. This would have ensured that the community would not have needed any external financial support to their producing the essential commodities. For this, the governments were required to lift all price curbs on agricultural produces and let the free market decide their prices like those of the industrial products.

Problems of Electricity Supply – A Letter to Officials Concerned

2011-12-24T16:05:00.000+05:30

Problems of Electricity Supply – A Letter to Officials Concerned

BSNL, a Telecommunication White Elephant of Government of India

2011-12-20T16:58:00.000+05:30

BSNL, a Telecommunication White Elephant of Government of India:

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Scenario and Prospects of forthcoming U.P. State Assembly Elections

2011-12-18T11:32:00.000+05:30

Democratic elections to form the next government in the most thickly populated state of India, Uttar Pradesh, are expected to be early next year. This means that the coming three months will see hectic political activities in the state with politicians reaching the people of the state with all their malicious designs to misguide them, as has been going on for the last four decades or so.

Until now, all candidates except those of the ruling political party in the state – Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), are dormant. The ruling party candidates have become active and spending huge amounts of money in their hoardings, banners, wall paintings, posters, etc. to win the hearts of the voters. This high profile propaganda does not have a word about how the people will be served or how their current problems would be solved. It is just a mindless exercise with huge spending of precious money. I wonder, what such representatives of people will do to the constituents after getting elected to power again.

The ruling party has the benefit of being in power to allure voters by declaring and implementing plans that may improve lot of the people, but no such exercises are being taken up. The whole government and administration has been geared up to exploit the people in all possible corrupt ways and amass wealth for use in the elections. Bribery has become an open phenomenon at all levels of governance from village chief to the chief minister, from peon to the chief secretary of the state. This is why, ruling party candidates have become active in their propaganda so early when other parties are dormant.

The ruling party, being headed by a woman of a scheduled caste, has a vote-bank of that caste reserved for her and so has an upper hand in the elections. No other party has such a large vote bank under her command. For this reason, even the next government is going to be formed by the present ruling party.

The present ruling party has done nothing of value to the people of the state except spending huge public money on memorials of leaders of a particular class. With this investment in industrialization of the state, some employment would have been generated to provide some relief to the unemployed youths of the state. But no politician in the country thinks of solving problems of the people but designs to keep the people in problems and hence dependent on them for their mercies.

With this scenario of the future, no improvement in the state with respect to infrastructures like electricity, communications, roads etc. is expected and the state shall remain backward and the worst-governed state of India for another five years.

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - X

2011-12-10T01:16:00.000+05:30

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - X:

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Rapid Transit System of New Delhi, India

2011-12-07T16:08:00.002+05:30

Indian leaders are projecting in international forums that India is developing at a fast pace, and to prove this they are developing roads, subways, flyovers and metro train lines in the national capital New Delhi with huge costs to the poor people of India and showing these to international visitors. How adversely these developments are affecting people of the country is not told to anybody. Here is an analytic view on what is happening in the name of developing India and with its impact on the people.

The national capital New Delhi is said to being gifted with a rapid transit system (RTS) to move people faster across the city. For this, a huge number of flyovers, and a metro train system with aid from Japan have been built in the city at exorbitant costs. The official website of the administrative corporation DMRC tells us that during phase I of the project, 65 km long tracks were laid at the cost of INR 105,710 million. Work on the second phase of 124.63 km is in progress for which no cost estimate is provided yet.

The best of this work is the Metro Train running across the city on a track of 32 km long with 31 stations in between taking a time of 90 minutes. Therefore, its average speed comes out to be a mere of 20 km per hour even at its longest routes. How then, it could be called an RTS????

These developments have attracted laborers from nearby states in search of their livelihoods, making the city much more congested and costly to live than before, forcing the laborers to live in unauthorized dirty slums like animals. Thus, the development works are forcing poor human-beings of the neighboring states to become animals instead of making them more humane.

The city has no ground space to run these trans, therefore tracks have been run overhead at about a height of 6 meters above the ground in a majority of areas while in the old city, the tracks are laid deep underground. Even the stations have been constructed overhead or underground. Both the layouts have consumed huge amounts of cement concrete and steel. If the same system were installed in areas around Delhi-New Delhi area for developing them, laying the tracks on the ground would have been very cheap and probably we would have a 300 km long track in the phase I with the same cost, benefiting a huge population spread on a larger area with no congestion and inhuman living conditions for anybody. That would have decongested the national capital making the life there more comfortable than now.

The national capital has mostly government employees drawing very high salaries and each one down to the level of a class II clerk can afford a personal car for his/her family and this has become the real situation. Now, with so many cars on the roads of Delhi-New Delhi roads, traffic jams are common and during peak traffic hours from 9 am to 12 noon and again from 4 pm to 10 pm, the traffic speed remains at about 5 km per hour, in-spite of huge investment on flyovers all over the city.

Similar developments are taking place in other metro cities of the country at the cost of neglect of rural areas where 70 percent of the country's population resides.

With such developments in a few cities of the country, most of the villages of the country remain without even a simple road transport service. Even for going from my village Khandoi to the district headquarter Bulandshahr at a distance of about 40 km, it takes about 4 hours with multiple changeovers and waiting.

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - IX

2011-12-05T16:12:00.000+05:30

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - IX:

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Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - VIII

2011-12-03T07:51:00.000+05:30

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - VIII:

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Why Sharad Pawar was Slapped - an Analysis

2011-11-30T23:23:00.000+05:30

Why Sharad Pawar was Slapped - an Analysis:

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Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - VI

2011-11-25T10:17:00.000+05:30

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - VI:

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Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - V

2011-11-19T08:08:00.000+05:30

Working of U.P. Electricity Officials - V

The Drama Called &Lsquo;anna Hazare’ | Socyberty

2011-09-02T17:01:00.000+05:30

The Drama Called &Lsquo;anna Hazare’ | Socyberty

A Glimpse of Indian Administration Functionality

2011-05-14T07:10:00.001+05:30

Under great constrains when I felt that Indian Administration, particularly at Ghaziabad district of U.P. State under BSP government is all out to bluff the people through adhocism, I sent the following email message to the Ghaziabad administrators and the Chief Minister of the state. This shows how the administrators bluff the people to save their own fraternity whatever irregularity they do in their working, remaining quite insensitive to the people's grievances.

from	Ram Bansal rambansal5@gmail.com
to		Ajai Shankar Pandey
cc		"DM, Ghaziabad" , "Chief Minister, U.P."
date		Fri, May 13, 2011 at 2:39 AM
subject		Fast unto Death by Hemlata, Shiksha Mitra, Palwada, Distt. Ghaziabad

hide details May 13 (1 day ago)

Dear Mr Pandey (former CDO Ghaziabad)

Please recall that I was on fast unto death along with the above-said Shiksha Mitra and her family members before office of the D.M. Ghaziabad and later in the Government Hospital where we were admitted by the administration under police custody, from March 21 to 27, 2011 when you were Chief Development Officer, Ghaziabad. You visited us in the hospital on 27th March 2011 as an emissary of the D.M. with an offer to provide justice within 10 days (by 7th April, 2011) to the victimized Shiksha Mitra who had been victimized by the officials of the education department and had been suffering for the last 3 years. Your offer was accepted in good faith and the fast was withdrawn.

An inquiry was conducted by DDO Ghaziabad under your instructions in which gross misuses of authority by Basic Shiksha Adhikari, Assistant Basic Shiksha Adhikari (BSA) and then Secretary of Shiksha Samiti were found in debarring Shiksha Mitra Hemlata from marking attendance in the school for her duties there. It was also found by that by not listening to various pleas of the Shiksha Mitra by the BSA and the DM Ghaziabad against her victimization, she had been denied justice.

In this regard, I met you in your office on 24th April, 2011 when you confirmed the above-said facts on the basis of the report you got from the DDO, and assured me of a quick redressal of the problem. By my experiences so far with your working, I am constrained to say that you miserably failed in performing your duty as per your promises, thus breached the trust we had in you as an emmissary of D.M. Ghaziabad..

After your transfer, the victimized Shiksha Mitra Hemlata had seen the new incumbent in your position many times but she is being denied justice even now. It seems to us now that the whole Ghaziabad administration under BSP government in U.P. believes in bluffing and victimizing poor, innocent and helpless persons like the backward class Shiksha Mitra Hemlata.

Since the poor and honest people can not confront the oppressive measures of the State and the powerful administrative officials, sacrifices of lives of the self to awaken consciences of oppressors remains the only way open to them. In this light, I am constrained to plan a massive 'Fast unto Death' along-with the Shiksha Mitra, her family members and many members of her community (Prajapati) at the DM's office Ghaziabad for which you, present CDO and the DM Ghaziabad are solely responsible.

Ram Bansal

B.Sc., B.E. (University of Roorkee - 1971)

Real Face of 'India Against Corruption'

2011-04-09T02:56:00.000+05:30

'Amar Ujala' a popular Hindi newspaper of the north India carried a news on 8th April, 2011 on Arvind Kejriwal stating that he was on fast along with Anna Hazare and that his children are doing a great service to the nation while the father is fasting. But the fact remains that Arvind did not go on fast at all, and he was spared in the name of managing/leading the show as per an official spokesperson of IAC. Arvind had been the principal negotiator with the government on the draft bill against corruption. Even then the news got published.

Another important fact of the show is that about 300 persons fasted at Jantar Mantar, New Delhi along with Anna Hazare, as per an enthusiast Avdhesh Bharadwaj. None of the IAC bulletins or the press mentioned their names, ignoring their sacrifices for the nation. That is the way modern Indian leadership has been apt at working. Persons like Arvind thrive on sacrifices of others without any being made by him.

It is like Nehru thriving on sacrifices of Gandhi during India's freedom struggle. Nehru managed the show and got the power after independence for which we continue to suffer even today. If we keep on having more of such leaders, we will never be out of the crisis, we are in today.

Basic Education in Uttar Pradesh, India

2011-03-22T03:09:00.001+05:30

Uttar Pradesh is one of the most thickly populated states of India where official corruption, inefficiency, exploitation and mismanagement are in fully booming. For information to all, I must tell here that the state government has recruited 35,000 police constables recently and 40,000 more are being recruited. Comparatively, state-run primary schools have regular teachers rarely and whatever small number is there, they are going to retire in another 5 years. But there are no recruitments being made for teachers in the basic education. The authorities need police to repress the people through terrorizing them, but need no teachers to educate the people.

A regular teacher's salary in a primary school is about INR 20,000 a month and the state government has no funds to pay for the regular teachers. So, in-stead of regular teachers, the government recruits temporary teachers from the locality at a salary of INR 3,500 a month to teach in primary schools. This is done to exploit a huge number of unemployed youths in the country particularly in the rural areas. These temporary teachers are called as 'Shiksha Mitra' meaning 'a friend of education'. Even for this meager salary, there is a tough competition, and a lot of bribery takes place in these recruitments.

Case of a Shiksha Mitra

Hemlata was a 'shiksha mitra' in her village Palwara in Ghaziabad district of U.P. She was removed from the position on her getting married as per the prevailing rule at that time. The rule was modified later by the government making even the married women eligible for being 'shiksha mitra' in their respective villages. So Hemlata was again taken back for the session.

She comes from a poor family of a so-called backward caste with no regular resource for the family's survival. Her father, a teacher in a government school, expired a few years back and in his place no dependent has been given a job while the rule

During the summer vacations, the authorities recruited another girl as 'shiksha mitra' to replace Hemlata. From the new session beginning July 2008, Hemlata was not allowed to sign the attendance register without giving her anything in writing though she was allowed to teach in the school. This resulted in no payment to her for her work in the school.

Since then, she has been representing to authorities at various levels in the education department and the administration to do justice with her. On every such representation, she was promised an inquiry and a suitable action, but nothing came out of these representations for the last 3 years.

The Last Resort

Seeing no end to her woes and continued apathy of authorities towards her pleas, she has now decided to raise her voice through ending her life with 5 of her family members by sitting on a 'fast unto death' in front of the office of the district magistrate of Ghaziabad who had been ditching her again and again by false promises and ignoring her pleas from 21st of March, 2011. For this, she notified the authorities - District Magistrate, Commissioner, U.P. Chief Minister, etc. in advance.

On her notice of 'fast unto death' to authorities, the only thing education authority of the district 'Basic Shiksha Adhikari' (BSA) has written a letter to his higher authorities for advice in the matter, with a copy to Hemlata. They consider that they have done their duty by doing it.

Crisis of Leadership in India

2011-03-06T02:48:00.001+05:30

Public leadership is taking care of public interests and it is most often possible by ignoring personal interests. This amounts to making sacrifices - a difficult task, rarely done by a few. In recent history of India, Mahatma Gandhi did it and inspired many others to follow him.

Another spectrum of leadership flourishing in India is of exploiters of public economically and psychologically. Economic exploitation is easily detected and voice raised against it. But curbing it has become difficult for the vicious cycle the Indian politics is in wherein political process is based on and controlled by money. This has reduced the so-called Indian democracy to a worst type of capitalism without any responsibility and accountability of the capitalist rulers. This is generally put under 'corruption' in the country.

But here I would like to deal with a different type of corruption of minds of the people through psychological blackmailing. The most glaring example of it has been the rise of Rajiv Gandhi to the office of Prime Minister of India just because of assassination of his mother. In India, mothers of many get assassinated daily but they don't even get due justice. With the assassination of Rajiv's mother, people were psychologically corrupted to have sympathy with the son and he was elected to the office. No body bothered to see whether he deserved to topmost executive position of the country or not.

Recently, in my area, a well-known criminal contested and got elected by a huge margin of votes to the membership of the District Panchayat. For getting the votes, he used to ask the voters to save his life from the process of law by electing him to the office and prostrate before them. This was again a psychological blackmailing of people like that done by Rajiv Gandhi.

Mahatma Gandhi won freedom from India from the British in 1947 through great sacrifices, but the fruits were grabbed by Nehru who became the first Prime Minister of India without making any sacrifices for the nation and her freedom. This is another way of exploiting the opportunity. This way of leadership has been flourishing in the country since independence while some persons are making sacrifices and others are grabbing the fruits of the sacrifices.

A current case of this type comes to my mind. To give push to anti-corruption movement in the country, a Gandhian Shree Anna Hazare has offered to go on 'fast unto death' to demand enactment of a law to punish the corrupt within 3 months of the corrupt practice coming to light. The offer was discussed in a meeting where I pleaded with the movement leaders to present themselves and their followers for such self-sacrifices to press the demand and save Anna Hazare's life. But this was not heeded by any of the leaders - any sacrifice not being in their blood or lifestyles. These are the modern exploiters of the opportunity of the Nehru-type. They are giving publicity to the offer of Anna Hazare to make sure that he does not go back from his offer of a self-sacrifice.

This type of exploitation-based leadership has been flourishing in the country since the days of Nehru, and this has made 'leadership' synonym of exploitation instead of sacrifices in the public interests.

Indian Administration - a Recent Experience

2011-02-26T07:13:00.001+05:30

On the third day of my protest fast unto death in my village against inadequate and hazardous electricity availability in the area, there used to be a gathering of 100s of people from many villages of neighborhood. The protest fast was duly notified to the police and other administrative officials like District Magistrate, Senior Superintendent of Police, local police station, etc. and all choose not to take notice of. Even a single constable was not posted on the site to keep a watch. The reason - they consider themselves as the sovereigns and have no interest in public affairs. I must remind here that India is said to be governed by a democratic system, although there are no signs of it in the whole working of the governments here. Political leaders and administrators are quite indifferent to problems of the people and don't want to be disturbed in their luxurious lifestyles at cost to public.

On the second day in the evening, Executive Engineer (EE) of electricity distribution was sent to me by the Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM), Siyana (Bulandshahr district) to look into the problems and persuade me to stop my protest fast. The EE told me that my demands were beyond his jurisdiction and he could do nothing about these, he dialed the SDM and asked me to speak to him. The SDM told me to stop the fast and he would look into my demands. I told him that my demands were concerned with electricity supply officials and he must perform his administrative functions only. He promised to visit me and see what he could do.

Until 4 pm of the third day, there was no administrative support at the site. A political friend visited me and extended his support to my demands and the protest. He spoke to the SDM and asked why not even a single police constable posted there where 100s of people are assembled in support of the protest. He also made me to speak to the SDM who said that he would come there only if I withdrew my protest fast. I was furious at this and told him to perform his administrative tasks and displayed my displeasure in strong words at the way he and other administrative officials were behaving in the matter.

Immediately thereafter, two police constables reached the site followed by one inspector and a constable. They sensed the area and gave their feedback to the police station in-charge. Then came the SDM and the police station in-charge with a large police contingent and a medical team including a doctor. The SDM insisted on the doctor to examine me and report that I was not really fasting so that he could arrest me for the falsehood and send me to prison. The team examined me thoroughly and reported that I was really fasting for the three days. This disappointed the SDM, then he came to me and I requested him to sit near me on the carpet I was was fasting on and where many persons were sitting in my support. He refused to sit down considering it an insult to his high position. In standing position he asked me to end my fast which I refused and he left me and went out near the crowd gathered there in my support and threatened the people with dire consequences if they did not go away from there immediately. A strong police action against me was on his mind. But none, except a few, moved and many told him that they were there in my support. He got furious at that and went away to his car.

Then can the police station in-charge to me, focusing his searchlight beam on many a faces including mine for terrifying us. He threatened me of arrest on charges putting the national flag on the camp of my anti-national activity and thus insulting the flag. He asked his constables to remove the flag who pulled it down and in the process damaged it. Seeing the crowd all around in the camp, he did not dare to arrest me but abused many persons including women for being present there. Then he warned me to leave the camp else get arrested by him some time in the night. I told him he could do anything he liked but the protest fast would continue. The SDM and the police contingent left leaving one inspector and a constable there.

Knowing the possibility of police action against me sometime in the night, about 100 women stayed in the camp for the night and more than 200 youths guarded the camp for the whole chilly night assembled around a camp fire. The police inspector kept on reporting the ongoings of the camp to the police station in-charge and he did not dare to take any action.

Thus, whole administrative setup of the country, freed through Gandhian way of peaceful protests and demands for legitimate rights, is designed and oriented for suppressing people and not allowing them to demand, even in peaceful ways, their legitimate rights.

My Fast Unto Death

2011-02-12T00:14:00.000+05:30

I have sent the following message today via email with copies to all other officials concerned.

The Chairman

U.P. Power Corporation Ltd.

Lucknow.

Sir,

Yesterday, EE, EDDIII Bulandshahr visited me and assured earthing of the transformer neutral without any further delay. But failed to tell me the reason why it could not be done so far for nearly a year that cost me heavily. As always for your subordinates, he was protective to the culprits EE, SDO and JE responsible for my going in for the unhappy drastic step of fast unto death.

Through this message, I intend to clarify on my point of view regarding my disappointments with the working of your field officials and my resolve of going on fast unto death.

1. Transformer Neutral Earthing

Today, after the news of my fast unto death spread, Executive Engineer Pramod Kumar, EDDIII, PVVNL Bulandshahr met me and assured me of providing an earth connection to the neutral point of the distribution transformer which I had been demanding for over a year and since the installation of this transformer. He was shown the present state of neutral earthing of the transformer, of which I am enclosing herewith two pictures for your kind perusal, and understand the way your field official work.

The neutral earthing of a distribution transformer is a common practice and is easily done by any workman installing the transformer. But the same was not done on this transformer for which I had been insisting for my sufferings due to its absence. I had requested the Junior Engineer K.L.Gupta, SDO Amit Kumar, and the then Executive Engineer Vishwambhar Singh for it several times during the last one year of my sufferings. But nothing was done. As I said in my previous mail to you, I went 3 times to the SE concerned to request him on this issue, but everytime he refused to see me.

Lastly, I had approached your high office on December 4, 2010 through an email message in this regard after which SDO Amit Kumar and an EE (Test) Rakesh Kumar visited me when I showed them the problem. They assured me to do the earthing within 2/3 days. But nothing was done by them for a long time. I informed you about this negligence vide my email message on Jan 22, 2011 which you did not take any notice of.

I feel that I have been victimized by your officials by not providing me even the routine services with ulterior motives. As a result, my computer system got damaged 5/6 times during the last one year and I have been made to pay a heavy price for that. Loss of my writing work is causing me a great concern.

2. Unchagaon Substation Renewal

The Unchagaon substation is more than 50 year old and most of its equipment are equally old and have expired their serviceable lifespans. This is a great hindrance for the consumers of the area in getting proper electricity supply. For over a year, I have been informed by your field officials on various occasions that demand for the renewal of equipment has been sent to higher officials and the renewal work shall be taken soon. But to my dismay, EE Pramod Kumar told me that no paper in this regard is traceable in his office and a fresh demand may have to be sent. This proves either your field officials have been bluffing the consumers on this issue or that they fail to perform even in their official duties. Whatever be the reason, it is quite disgusting to the consumers like me.

3. Unchagaon Substation Skilled Workforce

Consumers of my area have been suffering for a long time for shortage of skilled workforce at the substation. EE Pramod Kumar confirmed it by saying that not even a single lineman is available at the substation to provide repair and maintenance services to the consumers. And whatever casual unskilled persons for the purpose are available, they are ill-equipped. This leaves me with a greater disappointment.

4. Lines to Serve Consumers

My village had nearly 20 electricity connections for nearly 45 years of its electrification and the condition of line was very bad. With my arrival here, some improvements took place and I made efforts to convice many persons to get legally connected. As a result, total number of connections in the village exceeded 100. But many new consumers have no lines near their houses while they are made to pay bills of electricity. This is where I feel pity for these voiceless people being victimized by your officials.

With such a performance of your officials, I am told that JE K.L. Gupta has been rewarded with a promotion. EE Vishwambhar Singh is transferred to continue his luxurious lifestyle, and SDO Amit Kumar is enjoying his tenure here with all the appreciations about his performance from his superiors.

With this, I found myself at a dead end finding no solution of my problems. As a disciplined citizen and a humble consumer of electricity, I can't afford to confront the high profile officials of the organizations under your control. Most of the consumers in such a state of mind bribe your officials to get rid of their problems but I can't do even that for my awakened conscience. This leaves me with no option except ending my life to arouse conscience of your field officials and to show t the world how pitiable is the condition of electricity consumers in the state of U.P.

So, I continue to follow my resolve to go on a fast unto death from 20th February onwards in the village near the distribution transformer with four demands -

Strict action be taken against the three officials - EE Vishwambhar Singh, SDO Amit Kumar, and JE K.L.Gupta, for their utter dereliction of duties with ulterior motives to victimize me. Promotion of K.L. Gupta need be cancelled immediately.
Renewal of all Unchagaon substation equipment older than 50 years.
Provision of adequate skilled workforce at the Unchagaon substation.
Electricity lines in the village be completed up to the houses of legal consumers of electricity.

Yours

Ram Kumar Bansal

Village Khandoi, Bulandshahr.

My Life : Passion for making a Difference
http://r ambansal-the-theosoph.blogspot.comI

My Fast Unto Death

2011-02-02T12:32:00.002+05:30

I am severely constrained by the failure of getting proper electricity for my working in the village and find no solution of the problem from any corner. Therefore, I have decided to end my life in protest to arouse consciences of the electricity officials and have served the following notice to the district admninistration and the electricity officials.

"To

The District Magistrate, Bulandshahr

Sir,

I am a 62 year old Engineer now residing in my native village for the last ten years or so and devoted to authorship. I am a consumer of electricity of M/s Pashchimanchal Vidyut Vitaran Nigam Ltd. (PVVNL) at my village Khandoi, under jurisdiction of Jahangirabad subdivision under EDDIII, Bulandshahr for the last few years and have been struggling hard to get adequate and healthy electricity to my computer for my writing works but failing miserably again and again due to gross dereliction of duties by the field officials - Junior Engineer, Sub Divisional Officer, Executive Engineer, etc. of my area - of PVVNL. To present my grievances before the Superintending Engineer, Bulandshahr - Mr R. K. Gupta, I had tried to see him 3/4 times but he refuses to see the complaining consumers.

Presently, I am faced with sudden and acute voltage fluctuations in the electricity supply from 100 to 300 volts for the last six months which resets my computer every 10/15 minutes. While as per the norms, the variation must be limited to plus-minus 6%. I have studied the problem and found two reasons for it -

Neutral of the transformer feeding the line is not grounded properly making it a floating neutral with shifting potential due to variations in single phase loads on the line.
Widespread and regular thefts of electricity from the line by unauthorized consumers - domestic and power (having welding machine and single phase motors), supported by the Junior Engineer and other higher officials for their personal gains.

I have been insisting on the Junior Engineer and higher officials to properly ground the neutral of the transformer and gone up to the level of Chairman, U.P. Power Corporation Ltd. who instructed the field officials to attend to my problems. As a result, SDO and an Executive Engineer (test) Mr Rakesh Kumar visited me about a month back when I showed them the problem and they assured me the corrective action. But nothing has been done so far and the problem is getting more and more acute day by day.

This type of dereliction of duties and responsibilities by the officials towards genuine and law-abiding consumers is being faced by me ever since I applied for the electricity connection. There are repressions, exploitations, corruptions, etc. at every stage of official functioning.

I had taken the matter to Electricity Consumer Forum who being under the complainee PVVNL declared the voltage variation permissible for rural areas against all norms and laws. I took the matter to Electricity Regulatory Commission, who refused to entertain complaints from consumers. This all means that there is no solution within the present working of the field officials.

Other related problems of the area in respect of electricity supply are -

Unchagaon electric substation equipment are about 50 year old and have expired their service life. This causes frequent breakdowns and shutdowns in electricity supply too often during the scheduled supply hours.
While number of SEs in Bulandshahr is doubled and number of EEs is also increased, number of working linemen is reduced. This curtails on maintenance of equipment and lines and hence service to consumers
Many improvement projects are pending for a long time supposedly for want of funds while the scarcity of funds is being intentionally created by organized thefts of electricity by the field officials and their negligences in this regard.

Since, even the Chairman's office has failed in making the officials realize their duties and responsibilities, I am totally disgusted now and have no hope for any improvements. In the mean time, the greatest culprit of the lot Junior Engineer K.L.Gupta has been rewarded by a promotion by the officials for obvious reasons.

Therefore, I have decided to sacrifice my life to highlight to the world sufferings of electricity consumers at the hands of electricity officials in the state of Uttar Pradesh and to arouse the conscience of the electricity officials towards their duties and responsibilities towards the suffering consumers through going on fast unto death sitting near the distribution transformer in my village from 20th February, 2011. The responsibility of termination of my life lies with the above-said electricity officials.

This is for your kind information and taking notice of the same.

Yours

Ram Kumar Bansal

s/o Shri Karan Lal

Village Khandoi, District Bulandshahr"

Now, there is no way for the conscienteous person to survive in the highly deteriorated environment of the country.