Citizen’s Charter In India - Highlights And Challenges
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Category: General Law
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CITIZEN’S CHARTER IN INDIA - HIGHLIGHTS AND
CHALLENGES
Aparna. M, BBA LL.B. (Hons.), Tamil Nadu Dr. Ambedkar Law University (TNDALU), School of Excellence in Law (SOEL).
ABSTRACT
Citizen’s charter is a document formulated with the aim of building a sense of commitment towards the citizens. It ensures the consumers about the quality of the services provided by the public service providers. Citizen’s charter has greater significance in the functioning of a governmental organisation in relation to providing services to the citizens. The main motto of formulating citizen’s charter is to ensure fairness, transparency and quality in the services provided. It aims at building a sense of commitment on the service providers towards the citizens. This sense of commitment is intended to hold the public officials accountable for their acts. Effectiveness of citizen charters majorly lies upon its implementation and the grievance redressal mechanisms. In India, citizen’s charter are not legally enforceable.
Its legal enforceability is one of the major drawbacks in assessing its effectiveness. And also due to the lack of awareness among citizens regarding the citizen charter, its functionality is never questioned. This study aims at researching about how citizen charters are functioning to attain its motto and also analysing the areas of improvement of these documents. The research methodology includes studying various online resources including Government portals, academic journals, reports and blogs relating to citizen’s charter. This research is aimed at finding the major drawbacks in the implementation of citizen’s charter. The study is intended to put forth some recommendations to be fulfilled by the service providers as well as the citizens through which the functionality of the citizen’s charter can be improved which will assist in making it a better tool of administrative reform.
Keywords: Citizen’s charter, public services, transparency, standard, quality of services, grievance redressal.
INTRODUCTION
A Government functions with the aim of promoting social welfare through its governance.
Social welfare can be achieved by providing public services to the citizens. Providing public services is one of the main roles and responsibilities of the Governmental organisations. The true essence of democratic government is public services. The services should be provided to every citizen regardless of their social or financial status, educational background etc. public servants are vested with the authority to render public services and to make effective policies and regulations in ensuring the availability of these services to the public. Public services are inclusive of various spectrums. Each service has its own aims and objectives. Based on the intended outcome, its implementation process and procedures followed in the due course of its functioning differs.
But the common objective of all these services includes promotion of welfare by following the principles of fairness, transparency and equality. This objective is fulfilled by formulation of a citizen’s charter. A citizen’s charter refers to a document formulated in regards to the services offered by the Governmental organisations and other public service providers. This document aims at building commitment between the citizens and the service providers. The effectiveness of the services provided can be enhanced only when the service providers are made accountable for their actions. This accountability is imposed on the public service providers on the virtue of the instrument called citizen’s charter. The main aim of developing a citizen’s charter is to provide a voluntary written document by the service providers ensuring quality and timely delivery of services.
This also puts forth a mechanism through which the citizens can address their grievances in case of any failure in rendering services. This concept was introduced in the British Government and later it was adopted in India as well. The public service providers are entrusted with the responsibility of following the stipulated guidelines while formulating the charters. The ultimate goal of the citizen’s charter is consumer satisfaction. Consumer satisfaction is one of the parameters through which the effectiveness of the services can be examined. In cases of dissatisfaction with the services provided, there must be a proper grievance redressal mechanism which is open and accessible to everyone. Though the citizen’s charter is legally non-enforceable, still there is a system for complaint mechanism through which the citizens can raise their complaints and queries.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE:
1 Citizen’s charter -The Indian scene
Over the last few years, economic development is prominent in India. The literacy rate has witnessed a surge from 51.63% to 65.38% in the last decade. This drastic change in the literacy rates have resulted in increasing awareness among the Indian citizens regarding their rights. The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) is vested with the authority to coordinate, formulate and operationalise citizen’s charters. The Government departments and organisations are given a list of do’s and don’ts to formulate more focused and effectively made charters.1
2 IIPA report on citizen’s charter
According to the recommendations of the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) the charters are expected to incorporate the following elements: • Vision and mission statements • Details of business transacted by the organisation • Details of clients • Details of services provided to each client group • Details of grievance redress mechanism and how to access it • Expectations from the clients In addition, there are six principles of Citizen’s Charters. They are as follows: • published standards • openness and information
1 Home |Citizen's Charter (goicharters.nic.in)
choice and consultation • courtesy and helpfulness • redress when things go wrong • value for money.2
3. Citizen’s charters – A handbook
DARPG appointed an agency during the year 2002-03 to develop a model for internal and external evaluation of citizen’s charter. This agency extended its evaluation on the charters of
5 central Governmental Organisations and 15 Departments/ Organisations of few states. The
major findings as per the reports submitted by the agency are as follows: i. Most of the charters were not formulated by a consultative process. ii. By and large service providers are unfamiliar about the concept of charters. iii. Charters lacked adequate publicity and in most cases the charters were in the initial stages of implementation. iv. No allocation of funds for generating awareness about charters.3
4 The citizen's charter
Indian experience Problems faced in the implementation of the charters were as follows: i. There was no consultation involved in the formulation of charters. The Charters lacked focus. ii. The staff appointed for the effective implementation of the charters lacked adequate training and knowledge. iii. Instances of reshuffling of staff during crucial stages of implementation of the charters 2 Citizen’s charter in India. (A report by the Indian Institute of Public Administration) October 2008
3 https://www.cgg.gov.in
were a major drawback iv. No systematic procedure to create awareness among the clients about the charters. v. Unrealistic standards and time norms for the delivery of services were set in the Charters. vi. Lack of awareness and knowledge about citizen's charter among the service providers.4
5. Citizen charter of AR Department
The Administrative Reform Department of Delhi encourages participation of officers and staff members of Government of Delhi and members of other autonomous bodies and its undertakings. It also encourages the citizens and Non-Governmental Organizations to take part in suggesting reforms. This is done to facilitate a consultative process while forming charters. The officers and staff members of Government of Delhi and its autonomous bodies, undertakings will be awarded up to Rs.5000.5
OBJECTIVES
OF THE STUDY
1. To study to impact of citizen's charter in India
2. To analyse the effectiveness in the implementation procedure
3. To examine the challenges faced in the implementation of Citizen's Charter
4. To provide recommendations to enhance the effectiveness of Citizen's Charter.
RESEARCH
METHODOLOGY
This study involves comprehensive study of literature works from the online resources. The resources include Government portal, academic journals, blogs and articles relevant to the subject matter. These resources were referred to analyse the impact of Citizen's Charter in India.
4 https://niepid.nic.in
5 https://ard.delhi.gov.in/ard/citizen-charter-ar-department
It also aims at highlighting its effectiveness and also point out the major drawbacks in employing this tool. Extensive study of the materials intends to provide recommendations for the development of Citizen's charter. HYPOTHESIS Citizen’s Charter are vital tool in enhancing the quality and standard of services offered by the public service providers. Proper grievance redressal mechanism and few other procedural changes can enhance the effectiveness of citizen's charter. HISTORY OF CITIZEN’S CHARTER The conservative Government headed by John Major introduced the concept of Citizen’s Charter. It was introduced in the year 1991. This programme was initiated nationwide with the aim of improving the services of the Government. The programme was intended to enhance the quality of the services provided in order to meet the needs and wants of the people of the country.
The Labour Government of Tony Blair which promoted an active role for the state in increasing economic prosperity and social services, relaunched this programme in the year 1998 and named it as ‘services first’. The objectives of framing the Citizen’s Charter by the UK Government were as follows: i. Quality ii. Choice iii. Standards iv. Value v. Accountability vi. Transparency These principles were originally framed by the Government to improve the quality of the services provided to the general public. Choices regarding the services should be made available wherever possible. Standards as an objective, was included to inform the citizens about what to expect from the services and what is the procedure to be followed if the set standards are not met. The services rendered to the public must be valuable to the money paid by the people to the Government in the form of taxes.
The main motto of framing Citizen’s Charter is to maintain accountability and transparency. Accountability is imposed on the individuals and the organisations and transparency is maintained by framing rules and regulations, procedures, schemes and grievance redressal mechanisms. Originally there were only six objectives that were framed. Later the Labour Government headed by Tony Blair elaborated the principles and added nine more principles. The nine principles of Service Delivery that were introduced in the year 1998 are as follows: i. Set standards of service ii. Be open and provide full information iii. Consult and involve iv. Encourage access and promotion of choice v. Treat all fairly vi. Put things right when they go wrong vii. Use resources effectively viii. Innovate and improve ix.
Work with other providers The Citizen’s Charter was renamed and the improvised version was published in the year 1998. The originally framed principles were also changed with the aim of increasing the effectiveness of the services. The standards of the services were given more emphasis. The next objective focuses on promoting transparency by the Government by providing access to the information. As services are provided to meet the needs and wants of the people, this process should be made a consultative procedure in order to truly understand what the people expects from the service providers. The services provided must be known to the end users. This should be done by increasing awareness among the people. Also emphasis was created on providing Equal and fair treatment. Fair treatment can be established by formulating a grievance redressal system.
As the resources available are scarce and limited, it is crucial to use the resources effectively by considering the needs of the future generation as well. This helps in promoting sustainable development. Innovation can be brought in by accommodating alternative and sustainable ways of meeting the needs of the people. Improvisation in the services can be made by working with other providers to render quality services in the best possible way by also focusing on sustainability. EVOLUTION OF CITIZEN’S CHARTER: UK’s Citizen’s Charter was liked by many countries and many countries started adopting the idea and implemented similar programmes. Countries which adopted programmes similar to UK’s Citizen’s Charter are as follows: i. Australia (Service Charter, 1997) ii. Belgium (Public Service Users’ Charter,1992) iii. Canada (Service Standards Initiative, 1995) iv.
France (Service Charter,1992) v. India (Citizen’s Charter, 1997) vi. Jamaica (Citizen’s Charter,1994) vii. Malaysia (Client Charter,1993) viii. Portugal (The Quality Charter in Public Service,1993) ix. Spain (The Quality Observatory,1992) Many countries started similar programmes to that of UK’s model, whereas the rest of the countries started new ground by leaning on the service quality paradigm of the Total Quality Management movement. In the UK, the Government started adopting various others initiatives to achieve modernisation. There were various tools adopted to improve the public services such as the Business Excellence Model, Investors in People, Charter Mark, ISO 9000 and Best Value (Government of UK,1999).
A comparison between the major Citizen’s Charter initiatives taken by The UK Government, The Government of Malaysia, The Commonwealth Government of Australia, The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat clearly establishes the fact that the public services are provided following the service quality approach. This approach is embedded in them in different degrees. All these programmes aimed at focusing on meeting customer and citizen requirements. Other factors such as conformance to standards, involvement of stakeholder and continuous improvement. The approaches followed by these Government are mentioned below: The Government of Malaysia In the year 1993, The Government of Malaysia issued certain guidelines regarding the Client’s Charter. These guidelines were implemented to assist the preparation and implementation of Client’s Charter.
Client’s Charter is a written commitment by the agency to deliver outputs or services. The services has to abide by the standards of quality set by the Government. The Malaysian system follows the UK model. There is clear distinction between the charters made for the whole agency and its units. This system also follows the concept of ‘service recovery’ which aims at restoring the confidence and trust of the client when things go wrong. The commonwealth Government of Australia In the year 1997, the Commonwealth Government of Australia launched its Service Charter. It was initiated as its commitment to improve the quality of the services provided by the agencies. It aimed at promoting a shift from the bureaucratic processes to customer-focused outcomes.
It provided a goal for the agencies by initiating change, assessing performance through various procedures, and initiate improvement in the performance. The Australian Government Created Centrelink as a one-stop shop that provides access to Australian Government services to over
6 million customers. It adopted personalised approach to service delivery.
The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat started a service standard initiative in the year 1995. The idea was mainly adopted from the UK’s model of Citizen’s Charter. Service Standard was intended to provide friendly, courteous, respectful services and speedy responses.
CITIZEN’S CHARTER IN INDIA
At a ‘Conference of Chief Ministers of various States and Union Territories’ which was held in May 1997 in Delhi paved the way for adoption of Citizen’s Charter in India. One of the major outcome of the conference was to formulate Citizen’s Charter for large public interfaces such as the railways, telecom, posts, PDS, etc. Both the central as well as the state Government were directed to frame citizen’s charter. The formulators of the Citizen’s charters were directed to include standards of the services, time limit within which the services can be expected to be delivered, grievance redressal mechanism and provision for scrutiny by the consumer and citizen groups in an unbiased manner. The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) was formed to coordinate, formulate and operationalize the Citizen’s Charter in the country.
Citizen’s charter is framed not only for the citizens but also to the stakeholders. The stakeholders includes customers, clients, beneficiaries, ministers, departments, organizations, state, UT Government etc. The DARPG lists down more than 700 charters framed by various Government bodies and agencies across India. The model of Citizen’s charter adopted in India was based on UK model. The principles adopted by the UK government in formulating charters were also included in India’s Citizen’s Charter. Additionally, ‘expectations from the client’ was included as an objective in the citizen’s charter. But there is no legal enforceability for citizen’s charter. They are just mere guidelines to enhance the service delivery to the citizens. Regular monitoring of the charters by both internal and external agencies was done.
Most of the Central Government’s charters are posted in the official website. These charters are open for public scrutiny. It is advised to publish these charters in electronic media, through prints and through awareness campaigns. This will assist in creating awareness among the citizens and other stakeholders regarding the Citizen’s Charters. The key elements incorporated in the Citizen’s Charters of India are as follows: i. Vision and mission statements of the organization ii. Details regarding the business of the organization iii. Details of the clients iv. Details of the services provided to each client group v. Details regarding the grievance redressal mechanism and details about how to access it vi. Expectations from the clients.
OBJECTIVES
OF CITIZEN’S CHARTER The citizen’s charter of India has adopted a customer-centric approach. It aims at enhancing transparency, accountability and responsiveness in the public services. The key objectives of formulating Citizen’s charter are as enumerated below:
1 Empowerment of citizens
By informing the citizens about their rights and entitlements in accessing public services.
2 Improved service delivery
clear standards should be set for service delivery to improve timeliness and efficiency.
3 Transparency
by providing information on procedures, costs and timelines involved in availing services.
4 Accountability
by providing mechanisms for grievance redressal to hold the service providers accountable for their acts.
5 Public participation
through citizen participation in governance and by accepting feedbacks to improve quality of the services provided.
6 Capacity building
the skills of public officials should be enhanced to assist in delivering quality services.
7 Benchmarking services
creating benchmarks for the quality of the services to be rendered will help in evaluating the standard of services provided by comparing it with the services provided by various other departments. SIGNIFICANCE OF CITIZEN’S CHARTER The main motto of formulating citizen’s charter in India was to promote a more transparent and accountable governance. It was aimed at building a sense of commitment between the service providers and the citizens including the stakeholders. The public officials are held liable and accountable if they do not meet the set standards of service delivery. It has become a tool of administrative reform by empowering the citizens to hold the public officials accountable for their actions. By empowering the citizens with the knowledge about their rights and entitlements will help in fostering a sense of accountability.
When the citizens understand their rights and entitlements, they will be made aware of the services that they can avail and also about the standards of the services they are entitled to. By creating awareness among the citizens and stakeholders, there will be improvement in the services provided. Citizens and stakeholders will demand the government to take an active role in providing services. Transparency is one of the core aspects of Citizen's charter. Transparency can be created by providing detailed information about the services, procedures followed to render services, and a timeline to access the services. Often bureaucratic government is proven to be inaccessible to the citizens often leading to frustration among Citizens. Providing detailed information to the citizens and stakeholders will help in solving this problem of inaccessibility.
Transparency will ensure curbing corruption and inefficiency as the public officials are kept under check by the citizens and other stakeholders. They will be held accountable for their actions in case of any misuse of powers or inefficiency in rendering services. The efficiency of Citizen’s charter lies in its role in grievance redressal. The success of a grievance redressal mechanism should be inclusive of clear procedures for the citizens to follow while lodging complaints. This ensures and promotes responsiveness from the Government departments. This mechanism also helps in understanding and analysing systematic errors in its functioning. Trust is built between the Government and Citizens by laying down clear procedures for the citizens to follow while redressing their grievances Another significance of Citizen’s charter is public participation in the governance.
Formulating Citizen’s charters is a consultative process. Citizens are allowed to participate actively and provide their valuable feedback to promote innovation and provide improvements to improve the overall service quality. By creating a participative system, the needs and wants of the citizens will be reflected in the governance. Public participation promotes relevancy and public satisfaction in the services provided. The charter serves as a platform through which citizens can raise their voices regarding their needs and aspirations. In addition, the Citizen's charter facilitates benchmarking across various Governmental organisations and departments. Benchmarking includes setting standards that are expected from the Government department. By establishing specific standards, the performance of the Government departments can be evaluated and assessed.
Benchmarking also provides an option to compare the performance of various government departments. It also fosters a healthy competition among the various departments. Benchmarking increases motivation among the departments to improve their performance and foster excellence. Citizen’s charter of India serves as a pivotal tool for promoting good governance. By ensuring transparency, accountability, benchmarking and public participation, the challenges faced in the traditional bureaucratic governments are tackled. By listening to the actual needs and aspirations of the people, the democratic principles are reinforced in the system of governance.
CHALLENGES
The citizens' charter of India faces several challenges both in the formulation as well as in its implementation. The major setbacks experienced by the functioning of the Citizen’s Charters are as mentioned below: Awareness: one of the main challenges of citizens' charter is lack of awareness among the citizens and other stakeholders. Accessibility: the effectiveness of citizens' charter is limited by the inaccessibility of the charters by the citizens and the stakeholders. Failure in implementation: The effectiveness of citizens' charter is hindered by the failure in implementation of the charter. This results in inconsistent delivery of the services. Lack of quality services: The main aim of charters is to provide quality services to the stakeholders and citizens but there is inconsistency with the quality of services provided due to bureaucratic inefficiencies.
Monitoring: Due to lack of monitoring mechanisms, the effectiveness of citizens charter is degraded. There is failure in meeting the charter's commitment due to various instances of noncompliance of the officials. Limited resources: many institutions are struggling to provide quality services due to restraint in available resources. Scare and limited resources pose a huge threat to the effectiveness of charters.
RECOMMENDATIONS
One of the main challenges of citizens charter is the lack of public participation in the governance process. This is a major drawback as the needs and wants of the people are not truly represented by the Government. Increasing public participation in the process will facilitate in its effectiveness. • The second major challenge is the lack of awareness among the Public regarding the charters. When people become more aware of the charters, they will question the Government in case of any failures. This will improve accountability. Awareness can be made by media, awareness campaigns and through printed materials. • Evaluation process of the services provided should be made more transparent and stringent. Strict assessment will ensure proper functioning and also the set standards will be met by the Government officials.
• Changes should be made to the charters according to the changing needs of the people. Interests of all groups of society must be accommodated. Flexibility in accommodating changes will result in the success of charters. • The public officials who are involved in the process of formulating charters must be well equipped with the knowledge about the charters and its aims. The public officials must be made well aware of the aims and motto of formulating a charter. This will make sure that the charters made serves its purpose. • The grievance redressal mechanism must be made aware to the public so in case of any grievances they will know how to address it and where to address it. Proper functioning of this mechanism will enhance the quality of services provided. Stringent mechanisms must be adopted.
CONCLUSION
Citizen’s charter is a pivotal tool which ensures providing quality services to the citizens and stakeholders. It enables a sense of commitment between the citizens and the Government Department. Citizens' charter promotes transparency, relevancy, accountability and speedy delivery of services. It has proven to be a vital step taken by the Government in meeting the needs and aspirations of the people. Through this mechanism, people are able to voice out their expectations to the Government. This ensures the firm setting up of the principles of democracy. The effectiveness of the charters can be improved by making some changes to the existing mechanisms. By accommodating certain changes, the charters will be made even more successful. Flexibility is one of the key aspect that a charter needs to follow in order to be dynamic in its approach.
Accepting changes and accommodating improvements will result in successful functioning of this tool.
REFERENCES
https://darpg.gov.in/citizens-charters-historical-background https://www.civilsdaily.com/citizens-charter-importance-objective-features-problems-facedin-implementation-guidelines/ https://darpg.gov.in https://byjus.com/free-ias-prep/citizens-charter/ https://www.clearias.com/citizens-charters/#citizens-charter-1997-india https://prepp.in/news/e-492-citizens-charter-upsc-polity-and-governance-notes#limitation https://compass.rauias.com/polity/citizen-charter/ https://www.cgg.gov.in/core/uploads/2017/07/Citizen-Charter-Handbook.pdf https://goicharters.nic.in/public/website/home https://niepid.nic.in