Date:10/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/10/stories/2008091050030100.htm

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Online petition system clicks

C. Jaishankar

SIVAGANGA: The Online Grievance Day Petitions Monitoring System has gained momentum in the district, thanks to a proactive role played by a team of members led by Collector Pankaj Kumar Bansal.

The system, developed by the State unit of National Informatics Centre, facilitates the public to post their grievances through online at http://www.sivaganga.tn.nic.in/gdponline. Besides, petitions received at Monday’s grievance day and mass contact programmes, and those received by Ministers, Collector, Members of Parliament and Members of Legislative Assembly are processed by a team of IT personnel. Online petitioners receive acknowledgement with unique identification number for reference.

Six counters are opened in the grievance day hall with computer systems and necessary peripherals and Internet connection. The NIC has opened another website, http://www.sivaganga.tn.nic.in/gdpadmin, for official use.

They have to view the website almost daily to know the status of grievance petitions.

The official has to make enquiries about pending petitions. Based on the reply, the official will have to dispose of the petitions with proper reply or action taken message within 30 days.

The Collector maintains a close watch on the functioning of the system.

The system generates pending reports officer-wise, source wise and grievance wise, besides officer-wise disposal reports.

If the Collector finds inordinate delay in taking action, he enquires with the officer concerned.

“e-governance has come to stay. Online petition monitoring is user-friendly for petitioners as wells as officials. The petitioner can track the status of his petition on the website and take follow up action based on it. I see a remarkable change in the grievance redress system after the introduction of online monitoring,” said Mr. Bansal.