Jaipur, May 31, 2010
“Corruption is corruption-there is no small or big corruption and to uproot it, governance must be cultured among all stakeholders of society”, said Professor V.S Vyas, member of Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council and Deputy Chairman, Planning Board, Government of Rajasthan. He was delivering keynote address in an event ‘Dialogue on Governance’ organized by CUTS on the occasion of launch of a project ‘Developing a culture of good governance and accountability in the state of Rajasthan, India through involving CSOs and building their capacity with a focus on improving the public expenditure outcomes’ in partnership with Affiliated Network for Social Accountability- South Asia Region and Global Partnership Fund (ANSA-SAR & Global). He further said that peer pressure works better in case of developing culture.
“The Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) get only 30 days in a year to perform their duties and out of that 20 days are lost in discussing party. A school which execute it functions only 10 days in a year, will you like to send your children in the school. Mr. Rao Rajendra Singh was pointing out the fingers on the functioning of assembly and its pathetic condition. He said, a public representative is not able deliver his/her duty because of the lack of a functional system in place and blame goes on public representatives, ministers etc. He showed his anxiety saying that on every 10 month, people vote for their representatives to take care of them but even then accountability does not exists. He said that 24 percent of people don’t get two square meals a day even after 60 years of democracy and 93 percent people have to pay bribe for availing health services in this state of Rajasthan.
Dr Gopakumar Thampi, COO, ANSA SAR, mentioned about the initiatives of World Bank in setting up Affiliated Network for Social Accountability for South Asia region and informed that there are two more siblings are already in existence in Middle East and central Asia and those are working towards ensuring good governance in world. He said that ANSA-SAR & Global is supporting 19 organizations in 8 countries to deepen and widen the work on social accountability. He also appreciated the measures that CUTS is undertaking on the issue.
Mr. George Cheriyan, Director, CUTS international, in his introductory remarks said that he is hopeful that this initiative will bring a shift towards the culture of good governance from a culture of corruption. Stating about various data and studies, he said that the public expenditure outcome lies somewhere between 5-15 percent and 85 percent of the expenditure is diverted and do not reach to the people it meant for.
Mr Om Prakash Arya, Project coordinator, CUTS International proposed vote of thanks to chief guests and to around 70 participants arrived from Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Yemen, Egypt Argentina, Indonesia representing civil society organizations and also from government, media and civil society organizations from Rajasthan.
For more details, please contact
Mr. Om Prakash Arya, Project Coodinator: Cell- 91-99280 30210 email: opa@cuts.org
Mr. Amar Deep Singh, Project Officer: Cell-91-914617532; email ads@cuts.org