Madhya Pradesh was the first state in the country to implement the Time Bound Delivery of Service Act under the name Lok Sewaon Ke Pradan Ki Guarantee Adhiniyam 2010 bringing down the corruption rate to a much greater extent. As many as 16 states adopted the Right to Public services legislation since then.
Under the legislation, MP provides around 52 related services covering 16 departments. With the nodal department being the Department of Public Service Management, every government officer failing to provide the service within the stipulated time is penalized Rs 250 per day with the total amount not exceeding Rs 5000.
In most of the other states like Uttar Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Bihar, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Jharkhand, Kerala and Odisha; the penalty remains the same. While in Delhi, the penalty is of Rs 10 per day not exceeding Rs 200 and in Karnataka it is Rs 20 per day not exceeding Rs 500. In Himachal, the penalty can range anywhere between Rs 1000 to Rs 5000. In Goa, it is learnt that the penalty proposed is Rs 50 or Rs 2,500 per day, whichever is less. These states have different departments such as Personnel and Administrative Reforms Department, Revenue Department, Home Department, General Administration, etc as their nodal agency.
The crusade on improving public service delivery mechanisms started way back in 1997 where a conference chaired by then Prime Minister and comprising of Chief Ministers of various states and union territories decided that both the central and state governments formulate a citizen’s charter.
