Now, officials face penalty if work not done in time

NOIDA: The impact of Anna Hazare's crusade against corruption is finally being felt at the Noida Authority. The Authority has announced its decision to revive and implement its Citizen's Charter that was drawn in the year 2007.
Starting Monday, delay in completing an official work within a defined timeframe could mean punishment for Noida Authority officials. "Under the conditions of the Charter, officials are bound to give feedback to an applicant within the stipulated timeframe, failing which they would face serious consequences," said Noida Authority chairman and CEO Balwinder Kumar. "We are committed to provide efficient and prompt services to our allottees and citizens. We hope that, on their part, residents earnestly respond and reciprocate in a positive way to help us make Noida special," added Kumar.
In order to curb the rising menace of corruption and to bring transparency in the working pattern of the Authority, a former CEO of the Noida Authority had introduced the citizen charter in 2007. The aim was to ensure better standards of service and to respond and reciprocate in a positive way to the issues concerning the common man. "The objective is to make the administration simple, transparent, accountable and responsive," Kumar said.
Setting deadlines by revamping the earlier Charter, Kumar has set the maximum time for completion of a task in any department of the Authority at one week. Only permission for amalgamation of industrial plots would be allowed to be completed in 15 days, while the conversion of land and change in land use could take up to 30 days. The Charter makes it a right of every citizen to obtain time-bound delivery of services from the Authority.
"The idea is to make the lower bureaucracy accountable to the citizenry. Moreover, most works should not take more than 1-3 days to complete," said the CCEO. "If a civic official does not fulfill the stipulated timeframe, he will be held guilty and punished as per rules. The amendment was done to bring effectiveness and efficiency in the administration," he added.
The Citizens' Charter is now displayed outside every department of the Noida Authority. As per the charter, no important file will be kept pending with any officer or employee in any department of the Noida Authority for more than seven working days. The charter includes a list of services to be provided to the common man and the timeframe within which they need to be completed. All applications need to be addressed to the concerned heads of various departments who will comply by the Charter within the fixed number of working days. "People are requested to contact the concerned authorities in case of any non-compliance of the Charter," said Kumar.

Anna Hazare to bless Bundelkhand Congress

LUCKNOW: The battle for Budelkhand is all set to hot up with anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare throwing his weight behind the Bundelkhand Congress, an outfit launched by actor-turned-political activist Raja Bundela. On Bundela's invitation, Anna is expected to address three public meetings in the region in December, apart from scanning and choosing suitable candidates for the two-month-old party.
With migration rate of 63% and 590 reported cases of suicides, Bundlekhand has witnessed a fierce turf war between the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party and the Congress over the past four years. Thing have peaked last month after Samajwadi Party also threw its hat in the ring with party's state chief Akhilesh Yadav touring the region extensively. Bundela's fledgling party hopes to highlight the graft, affecting various packages and projects including the MNREGS and make a dent in the divided and confused vote bank.
Three districts - Jhansi, Chitrakoot and Banda - have been shortlisted so far, Bundela told TOI. "However the final decision will be taken during the core team's visit next month," he said. Bundela had parted ways with the Congress party a year ago. Having spearheaded a campaign for separate Bundelkhand, he now adds separate Purvanchal, Vidarbha and Telengana to his wishlist.
The strategy would differ in each, he pointed out. Unlike the Budelkhand, where his outfit hopes to contest all 37 seats, in Purvanchal, it will confine itself to select constituencies to make a debut, he said. Though corruption would be the running theme in both the areas, in Purvanchal, health concern would top the agenda. "The focus would mainly be on Japanese encephalitis and the havoc it has caused over the past decades," he said. "JE menace affects at least 17 districts in the eastern belt and has claimed 10,000 lives over the past decade, but could never become a serious issue for any of the major political parties in UP .
Apart from paying lip sympathy to the cause and fooling the gullible masses by false promises during the poll time, none has bothered to demand or frame a blueprint to fight it off, he said.
"We have decided to go region-specific and to micro levels," he said. "We don't have muscle or money power but we do have sincerity of purpose which counts after Anna's advent on the scene," he added.

Bribe For Pension

This 86 yr old Freedom Fighter is not getting his pension because of some people who wants bribe to do their duty.
And Why Is Govt Sitting On LokPal Bill?

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Cycling To Support Anna Hazare

 Inspired by Anna's agitation, few college students from Pink City are cycling to Delhi to 'enlighten' the people about the 'Jan Lokpal Bill'.

Chinmay Sharma (20), Mohit Singh (19) and John Dessa (21) are on way on their bicycle to join Anna Hazare's anti-corruption stir at Ramleela Maidan when TOI spoke to them at Statue circle on Thursday evening. On way they were to be joined by Tusshar at Transport Nagar.

To a query if it is too difficult to cover a distance of nearly 265 km on a bicycle, is it not too harsh, Chinmay, smiled and said, "An old man on fast for the past 10 days is facing more difficulties than that. I think every Indian youth should fight against corruption."

"Though I am not promising to change the system or society but through this bicycle ride I plan to make the people aware of the Anna Hazare's Jan Lokpal Bill," Chinmay said.

Mohit said, "It is the right time to tell the world that youth of this country are not ignorant of the crisis we are facing."

Asked when they planned the venture, Mohit, said, "We have been doing things like going to Puskhar on a bicycle and had participated in a few rallies here. But, we thought of making our hobby more meaningful."

"Raaste mein logon ko Jan Lokpal batayenge (We will make people aware of Jan Lokpal on the road)," Mohit asserted.

"We will be reaching Delhi on Saturday noon. It has been planned that on the way to Delhi, at the halt stations we will interact with people varying from villagers to schoolchildren," John Dessa another member of the group said.

The four had never cycled such a long distance but were confident. "There are some people who have organised our accommodation, food and other necessities. Hopefully we will reach Delhi and meet Anna," John said.

Chain Reaction For Anna Hazare

Bangalore Techies Make The Longest Human Chain From Sarjapur-Bellandur,Outer Ring Road to ITPL, Whitefield To Support Anna Hazare & Jan LokPal Bill

CHAKDE! Babudom Looks On Techies As The New-Age Milch Cows. On Wednesday, They Hit Back In Their Own Way

CHAIN REACTION

7,000 Techies. 17 Km. United Colours Of Bangalore.

 On any other day, they would be developing software programs. On Wednesday, they decided to come on to the streets and support Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption movement. 

    Shouting slogans which reflected their anger against corruption, the 7,000-odd techies stood hand in hand on the stretch from Sarjapur junction to Information Technology Park Bangalore (ITPB), Whitefield, the software hub of the city.     Their message to the Centre was loud and clear: Don’t drag your feet in introducing the Jan Lokpal bill. The human chain spanned several tech parks and prominent IT companies, residential apartments and a college.     The companies included biggies located in IT parks, like Eco Space, Intel, Cisco, Salarpuria Tech Park, Global Tech Park, Nokia,Symphony, Oracle, JP Morgan, International Tech Park, Accenture and many smaller start-ups too.     If you thought these were the young and fiery lot of employees, there was a small surprise in store as senior executives came out in equal numbers to raise this serious issue.     The chain started from ITPB, crossing Vaidehi Hospital, Sap Labs, CMR, Kundanahalli, Innovative Multiplex, JP Morgan, Cisco, Eco Space, and ending at Sarjapur junction. Around 11.30am, the employees started walking out of their offices and lining up right beside Outer Ring Road. Most had pamphlets, placards and the tricolour in their hands. The activity gained momentum around 12.30pm, when many young ones started sloganeering and moving on bikes with huge flags. Many others were on open trucks, tractors, buses and cars. They waved at the people forming the chain and cheered them. By 1pm, the chain was fully formed but intersected due to various construction works along the route. The volunteers took ample care that the protest did not hamper traffic. However, traffic movement was slow. They began returning to their workstations post lunch. 

ANGER FEEDS ANGER 
Namita, a techie with Accenture, was reminded of the angst that freedom fighters had expressed. “After the freedom struggle, this is a huge movement. We want to show the nation that the youth of India will not tolerate corruption anymore.” 
Her colleague Chhavi said: “We needed just one leader. The leadership was missing. Now that we have Anna, we don’t want to miss this opportunity to fight the government.” 
    Rajpal Fogawat, a quality assurance engineer with Synergise, stood with a huge portrait of Anna Hazare. Fogawat, who had taken leave for a week to support the cause at Freedom Park, said the anger in the common man was obvious. “Even a layperson like me understands the difference between the Lokpal bill and the Jan Lokpal bill. The bill should be passed in the same format as given by us. Almost 100 employees from our small company have come out to express their anger,” he said. 
    Raja Venugopal Rao, a software engineer with Honeywell, said corruption is a common problem. If politicians are really concerned about the problems of our country, why are they so hesitant in implementing the Jan Lokpal bill? “Politicians have thousands of crores and here we have people struggling to earn Rs 1,000. Hope they aren’t interested in creating a Libya-like situation here,” he said. 
    The techies filled the air with slogans like ‘Vande Mataram, Sarkar Besharam’, ‘Bhrashtachar Bhagayenge, Garibi Hatayenge’.Chain mail, FB alert did the trick 
    It didn’t take any effort to bring these 7,000-plus techies onto Outer Ring Road from their offices. All it took was a chain email in the IT fraternity and an alert on Facebook, and  techies poured out for the cause on Wednesday. 
    Technical head of an IT company and a volunteer for India Against Corruption, Raghuvir Desai said it took hardly any effort by the organizers to get the techies to join the human chain. “On Saturday at Freedom Park we decided we would organize this human chain. It was followed by chain mails and updates on a social networking site. A profile was created called ‘Anti-Corruption Outer Ring Road Movement’. We didn’t follow up with any companies. Everyone just came,” he said. 
    

Sujata, a technical writer and supporter of the movement, said: “I inspired all my young colleagues and also those of my age to come out and protest against corruption.” She also fasted on Wednesday to support Anna Hazare. 

    “If a 74-year-old man can take up the task of implementing this law, then why can’t we come out in support? I think our employees came in large numbers because of him,” said Aruna Kambatla, referring to Hazare. Pradeep Kaimal and Nishi P from Cadence got mails and alerted all their colleagues. Most techies enjoyed being together and said their companies don’t mind them taking a few hours’ break from work for this cause

Times Campaign - Act Against Corruption

In last 3 days, Times Campaign 'Act against corruption', has witnessed
unprecedented support. Overall (since the campaign was started last month) more than 8.40 Lac people have already casted their vote, 30,000 plus readers have commented (highest ever on any article) and 21000 plus people have shared it on their respective FB pages from TOI.com. The statistics mentioned above do not include few more thousand comments & 'Likes' that we have received on TOI - FB page.

Join campaign for a strong Lokpal law to make India corruption-free

The people of India are sick of corruption. Anna Hazare's Jantar Mantar fast, which got overwhleming public support, has not gone in vain. The latest government version of the proposed Lokpal Bill is certainly an improvement over the anemic bill drafted by the law ministry in December 2010, but the governemt is still not ready to go the whole hog. It wants to retain certain controls. This, unfortunately, may provide escape routes to the corrupt.

It's not too late to tell the government that we, the people of India, do not want any compromises on the anti-corruption law. Join the campaign by clicking the "JOIN CAMPAIGN" button below. You can also join the campaign by giving a missed call to the toll-free number 08030050051 or by sending lok as anSMS to 58888.You can also verbally record your support for the campaign on Hibuddy by dialing 58888199.(Only on Airtel, Reliance, Tata)

Parliament Clears Anna Hazare's Demands

Lok Sabha and Raja Sabhawere adjourned today after adopting a 'sense of house' on three key issues raised by Hazare by a thumping of desks.

The 'sense of the house' resolution moved by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee reads:
"This house agrees 'in principle' on following issues -

(i) citizen charter,
(ii) lower bureaucracy under Lokpal through an appropriate mechanism
(iii) establishment of Lok Ayukta in the states;
And further resolves to forward the proceedings of the house to the Standing Committee on Law and Justice while finalising its report."

The 'sense of the house' is to be conveyed to Hazare shortly through Lok Sabha speaker Meira Kumar, sources said.

Mukherjee said that for 40 years, the government could not pass a Lokpal Bill.

I accept it as a lapse of our governments, Mukherjee said.

One piece of legislation, however strong and empowered it may be, cannot completely eradicate corruption, Mukherjee said in Lok Sabha.

There is need for change in system and we are doing so, Mukherjee said.