Mentors Comment:
Briefly explain the concept of Citizens‘ Charters.
Succinctly discuss their state of implementation and the reasons for its disuse.
Enlist the measures to make the Citizens‘ Charters more effective.

Answer:
A Citizens‘ Charter is a document that outlines the commitment of a public body towards standard, quality and timeframe of service delivery along with grievance redress mechanism. It makes a public institution transparent and accountable and thus can be an effective tool to engage the civil society and to curb corruption.

However, Citizen Charters have fallen into disuse mainly due to following deficiencies in charters:
Poor design and content: Critical information that end users need to hold agencies accountable are missing in charters.
Lack of consultation: End-users and NGOs are not consulted when Charters are drafted.
Inadequate groundwork: Non-familiarity of the service providers with the philosophy, goals and main features of charters.
Lack of public awareness: Effective efforts of communicating and educating the public about the standards of delivery have not been undertaken.
Resistance to change: Vested interests work for stalling the Citizens‘ Charter altogether or in making it toothless.
Lack of revision and periodic updation of charters.
Absence of legal backing to charters.

To address the above issues and to make these Charters effective tools of accountability in public service, following measures can be undertaken:
Design of the Charters: There is a need for citizens and staff to be consulted at every stage of formulation of the Charter.
Periodic evaluation of the charters should be done to measure their implementation and address the deficiencies in their design.
Remedy for non-action: Charters should clearly spell out the remedy/ penalty/ compensation in case of lapse in execution.
Citizens’ awareness and engagement: There is a need for wider publicity of the Charter through print and social media.
Regular feedback should be taken from the end-users.
Rating of public agencies: Visitors‘ feedback can be taken as one of the parameters.
Sevottam model can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of the Charters.
Creation of database on consumer grievances and redress.

The Citizens‘ Charters have given desirable results in various countries such as the United Kingdom, Malaysia, Australia and Canada. We can study the CCs‘ implementation in these countries to successfully execute the same in India. It is advisable to give legal backing to these charters to mandate the concerned departments to implement them with all seriousness.