Excelsior Correspondent
NEW DELHI, Dec 7 : Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Science & Technology; Minister of State (Independent Charge) Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh today said that technology driven governance can address rising public aspiration, for which citizen participation is as important as keeping pace with fast evolving technology tools.
Delivering the valedictory address on the two-day “National Convention on People Centric Urban Governance in India” at IIPA, New Delhi, Dr Jitendra Singh said, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has given a sustainable model of governance based on a new approach and a new work culture.
Dr Jitendra Singh reiterated that ever since Prime Minister Modi took over in 2014, transparency, accountability and citizen-centricity became the hallmark of governance . He said, as challenges and benchmarks keep changing, this model of governance adapts to the new milieu in a dynamic fashion.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, it’s time to ponder that with the rise of Aspirational India and rapid technological advances happening simultaneously, the challenge before policy makers is to use the technological tools to bring “Ease of Living” for common man, both in the urban as well as rural areas. He added that the Urban-Rural barrier is getting broken everyday with emergence of new technologies especially in the fields of communications, transportation, e-marketing and penetration of citizen friendly digital apps and tools.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, the pace and growth of urbanisation in India poses enormous challenges to urban governance. He said, states such as Delhi, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Goa, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka are already on the verge of or substantially moving to become more urban than rural. But, on the other hand, low urbanised states such as Bihar, Odisha,Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, parts of Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan face economic upliftment challenges as surplus labour from agriculture moves to select cities as happened so far since independence, the Minister added.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, people-centric Urban Governance has to be reflective of how the various constituents of public service delivery are organised to increase the welfare of citizens as well as generate an investment climate that is capable of sustaining the rapid growth. He also added that people centric planning to make municipal services in accordance with needs of the growing population is the first area of correction. Institutional coordination is next in order to minimise overlapping of agencies and functions and third area is ease of doing business which is given due attention with emerging focus on e-governance, he added.
The Minister pointed out that some of the steps that have been taken by Government of India have great potential to transform the urban sector like Pradhan Mantri Avas Yojana(Urban), PMSVANidhi to provide collateral free working capital to street vendors in our cities and towns and urban infrastructure across urban centres along with Swachh Bharat mission 2.0 with focus on access to safe sanitation to all .These initiatives have made significant impact and are people centric in nature, the Minister pointed out.
Dr Jitendra Singh concluded by saying that the national convention has deliberated on these issues and prepared a roadmap of future actions keeping in mind our national vision of making India a developed nation during the next 25 years of “Amrit Kaal”.
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