Public Services Delivery and Grievance Redressal Initiatives: A Case Study of Himachal Pradesh
| Date | 01 September 2020 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0019556120960006 |
| Published date | 01 September 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Notes |
Public Services
Delivery and Grievance
Redressal Initiatives:
A Case Study of
Himachal Pradesh
Baldev Singh Negi1
Introduction
There is a general consensus among the policy planners and public representatives
on the need to improve the quality of services provided to public, particularly the
poor and remotely inhabited. The quality of services is mainly constrained more by
managerial inefficiency than lack of resources. Governments are striving to deliver
efficient and effective public services to achieve better service quality, with less
waiting time, improved cost effectiveness, higher productivity and more transpar-
ency. The note discusses the initiatives taken in Himachal Pradesh to provide
timely services. The Public Service Guarantee (PSG) Act, 2011 obligates the
departments under the state government to enlist the services that could be deliv-
ered in public in definite time frame. The government’s innovative flagship pro-
gramme Jan Manch is striving to redress the public grievances by organising public
meetings away from the district headquarters or at the door step of the public by
ensuring the presence of all the heads of line departments so that the grievances are
redressed on the spot. These initiatives are contributing immensely to good
governance.
India predominantly lives in rural society with 638,365 villages in the country
as against about 300 cities and 5,161 towns. As per the Census 2011, out of 121
crore Indians, 83.3 crore live in rural areas while 37.7 crore stay in urban areas.
Rural areas are characterised by dispersed population, low population density
and income. These socio-economic characteristics differentiate them from urban
areas. These factors must be understood so that independent rural communities
Note
Indian Journal of Public
Administration
66(3) 380–389, 2020
© 2020 IIPA
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DOI: 10.1177/0019556120960006
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1 Department of Interdisciplinary Studies-IIHS, Himachal Pradesh University, Shimla, Himachal
Pradesh, India.
Corresponding author:
Baldev Singh Negi, Department of Interdisciplinary Studies-IIHS, Himachal Pradesh University,
Summer Hill, Shimla, Himachal Pradesh 171005, India.
E-mail: bsnsince79@rediffmail.com
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