Change won’t happen, unless citizens jump in to make it happen

State, Market, Society

Among all the complaints about infrastructure in Bengaluru, there is one that seems particularly frustrating -- “Only last week, this road was re-laid by the municipality, and already, some utility is digging it up. Why can’t these guys coordinate their work?” This, we have heard a thousand times.

In principle, everyone will tell you that such things should not happen. Who can argue with sensible cost-savings and making sure that the public is not needlessly inconvenienced? Not only citizens, even those in government will agree that this is really bad. Nonetheless, this happens all the time. Each time, the same complaint is repeated, and each time, it seems that nothing really comes of it.

One can find many examples of such things, where there is no difference of opinion on the principle, but in practice, nothing much happens to correct the course. Should corruption in public works be tackled? Should we make sure that lakes don’t catch fire? Should dumping of waste in villages around the city be stopped? Should public schools teach at a much better level than they now do?

Of course, yes. And speaking of schools, the government recently announced that 62% of those who took the PUC exam passed. The average for those taking the SSLC exam -- prior to Covid, during which a lot of students were promoted without the exam -- was about 70%. And of the children in the state who are of SSLC age, only about 70% even take the exam. Altogether, less than one-third of the children in the state get a full education.

Is this appalling? Yes. Should something be done to dramatically improve these numbers? Yes. Everyone agrees. In fact, everyone seems to have been in agreement for a long time. It goes on, anyway, as though that agreement didn’t exist.

Back to the road-digging. Usually, when people tell me about such incidents, I point out that they were the only ones present at both times -- when the road was laid, and when it was dug up. Unlike the municipality, which confined itself to laying the road, and the utility that limited itself to digging it for its work, the citizens living along any street are there all the time. If anyone is in a position to end this madness, we are. And if we did something about it, such things would reduce, and eventually stop.

But we usually don’t intervene. There are many reasons for this. Sometimes, we think this is someone else’s job, and it is they who should be doing this. At other times, we tell ourselves that whatever we can do is bound to be too little, too late, and therefore we don’t do anything. Whatever the reason, it’s probably correct to say that overwhelmingly, those who are frustrated by things they don’t like are not involved in trying to stop them from happening.

That, really, is the problem. A lot of bad things can be stopped, and many more good things can be done. But new administrative orders and process reform alone will not be enough to achieve these. Without the people’s participation, the change will be fleeting, at best. Years ago, for a while I convened a coordination committee of the different city agencies in South Bengaluru, and over a few months there were some improvements to public works. But those changes were not hard-wired into the governance of the city, and eventually they faded away. Those who profit from poor public works and failing services know quite well that the public’s participation is key to reform. That’s why most of them are happy to represent us, but do not actively seek our participation. Their consistent model is “you tell me, and I will deal with it”. That’s a recipe for not dealing with most things. Which suits them fine.

Now that the delimitation of ward boundaries for the next Council is incomplete, there is a chance that the long-overdue city council elections will be held in the next few months. In the lead-up to that election, a lot of people will make a lot of promises. When you’re listening to those, keep one other thing in mind -- a lot of the changes we want to see will not come true unless we participate in making them happen. If we are content with hearing false promises, there will always be a long line of politicians willing to make them.

Participation is not that hard, contrary to what people imagine. Just knowing the designated officials responsible for public works and services, and interacting with them occasionally, is enough to stop a big chunk of the incoherence in their actions. We don’t have to do their jobs for them, but by standing next to them, we can see many problems much better, which in turn helps us think of some of the solutions, too. That’s not the solution by itself, but it is surely a much-needed part of the response.

The smaller the distance between State and society, the more robust our civic outcomes will be. Think of each contract for work in the city, by any agency. And assume that in each of those contracts there is a clause that says, “local citizens will observe and consent to this work, to ensure that it is carried out to their satisfaction”. That clause is like any other in the contract. If it’s not done, the work can’t be done right.