Case Study: MyGov enabling participative decision making – Budget 2015
Noted social activist Michael Moore was at his pithiest best while summing up the essence of democracy: “Democracy is not a spectator sport, it’s a participatory event. If we don’t participate in it, it ceases to be a democracy.”
While commentators have, over the centuries, debated the multiple benefits of democracy over other forms of governance, it is its participatory nature that has almost unanimously been recognised as the most outstanding feature. Democracy, in its normative form, while electing a leader through a transparent process, expects that leadership to make decision making a participative process where citizens have an important pro-active voice in policy making. But what is it about participative leadership that makes it so attractive?
First, involvement in decision-making improves the understanding of the issues involved by those who must carry out the decisions. This means the actual effect of the policy is factored in at the stage of policy making itself thereby insulating it from remaining a mere academic exercise. Second, people are more committed to the actions flowing from the policy where they have been involved in the relevant decision-making. The citizens, who will actually be affected by the policy, have become a stake holder in the policy so framed rather than it being handed top down, and thus have more stakes in making the policy work. Third, people are less competitive and more collaborative when they are working on joint goals. Fourth, when people make decisions together, the social commitment to one another is greater and thus increases their commitment to the decision.
Mahatma Gandhi, one of the greatest personalities of twentieth century, was among the first to understand the power of such participative decision making process to mobilize public opinion and this is what contributed to his enormous achievement of converting the freedom movement into a mass movement. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, inspired by the great Mahatma, has often spoken of learning from this great heritage and deploying it in modern context of converting the development and governance paradigm into a mass movement.
It is with this ambition that MyGov was launched by the Prime Minister on 26th July 2014 as a citizen online engagement platform. The avowed aim of the platform was to achieve the following purposes: A) Pro-active citizen participation in policy making; B) Citizen participation in governance tasks; and C) Volunteer participation to achieve synergy in the ideas and discussions in online world with action on the ground.
One of the conscious decisions taken during the conception stage of MyGov platform was to have no activity on MyGov without a buy-in by a relevant department or ministry of the government of India. This was done to ensure that all discussions and tasks on MyGov would have a defined closure point and therefore the valuable time that citizens spend on MyGov would be tied up with a clearly defined proposed action of the government. This way, MyGov would become a useful platform for citizens, retaining the flavour of a free flowing online general discussion forum, while avoiding the trap of only remaining a discussion forum.
This conceptual clarity at the level of the head of government, with a clearly defined mandate to ministries and departments to factor-in the citizen suggestions in discussions and tasks they have initiated on MyGov, in the eventual policy, program or schemes they frame, has resulted in much success for MyGov since its launch. The names of the very popular Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana and the now ubiquitous logo for the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan were generated by contributors on MyGov. The Prime Minister himself has used the MyGov platform to regularly source citizens’ ideas and aspirations for his very popular, monthly “Mann ki Baat” dialogue with citizens.
The confidence generated by these early successes encouraged both ministries and the citizens to engage in crowd sourcing for even broader participation. The Ministry of Railways and the Ministry of Finance, thus initiated discussions seeking ideas from citizens for consideration for the Railway Budget and the General Budget respectively. In what was clearly a first, crowd sourced ideas from citizens, generated on MyGov, became actual government proposals in the respective budgets for the year 2015-16. The implications of a direct platform for citizens, where they could articulate their aspirations and needs to the government, without any intermediary or middlemen, can be seen in some of the far reaching ideas that became actual budget proposals.
For the Railway Budget, suggestions that have been incorporated in the actual proposals include proposals to fit bio-toilets and vacuum toilets in rail coaches to improve cleanliness; providing concessional e-tickets to differently-abled passengers; provision to order food online at the time of booking of tickets through IRCTC; integrating popular private food chains with the pantry network of railways; installation of digital display networks on platforms to provide real time information to citizens and the involvement of ISRO for providing audio-visual warnings to passengers at unmanned level crossings by using geo-spatial technology. A more detailed description of MyGov user suggestions reflected as actual proposals can be read here.
In the General Budget for 2015-16, some of the innovative proposals that have been incorporated include the proposal to enable monetization of gold and launching of sovereign gold bonds; proposal to abolish wealth tax and simplify tax structures; special tax incentive for promotion of Yoga; proposal to make sharing of PAN number mandatory for cash transactions above a specified value; 100% tax benefit for contributions to Swachh Bharat fund; utilization of vast postal network for improving access to banking in remotest corners of India and the proposal to introduce a law to penalize non disclosure of foreign bank accounts and to tackle benami property holdings in India. A more detailed description of MyGov user suggestions reflected as actual proposals can be read here.
These suggestions were thought of by the citizens themselves. They are aspirational in nature in some cases and practical in others. A gold monetization scheme can have transformational affect on the economy. Integrating of popular food chains with rail pantry network and simultaneously enabling the citizens to order food online would, while appearing as simple suggestions, enormously change the passenger experience for those who are travelling by rail network.
The implications of such participative decision making process are enormous. Development as a paradigm of general national discourse is a rather abstruse concept. However, if the broad long term governance framework can be converted into an easily identifiable specific time bound programs, with which the citizen can identify themselves in the immediate term, then it is easier to weave it into the national fabric. The General budget each year is an important policy document of the government, detailing the framework by which the government intends to manage the economy in the medium to long term. However, what is in it for me in the next budget is the most pertinent question by citizens in the build up to each year’s budget. The art of socially and emotionally investing the people in the governance paradigm is to somehow interlink these two strains. With MyGov platform acting a bridge, the citizen now has not to wait till the end of budget process to find out what is in it for them but can pro-actively help in deciding what do they want from the budget. One simple exercise of participative decision making and the budget becomes not a government’s document alone but a document of the people. The emotional commitment gets built-in and the abstruse development paradigm is on its way to becoming a participative mass movement. The platform that is enabling this is the MyGov platform, translating the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi into a reality.
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(4).Doctor, mechanic etc. Pay 1.5% tx on service work (5).If a tax payer paid 50000 rs tax so his purchase amt is=50000×10=500000 but he wants to buy car=700000rs so taxable amt is200000 rs so he will pay 5% tx on 200000rs&who do not pay any tx they pay 5% more tx on bike, car , bungalow etc(7)For make white money pay 5%tx on black money
If Government wants more income They should take big steps like No any taxes like i.tax ,vat etc. (1)One time sales tax=selling cost of manufacturer + 5%to25% tax=lending cost of wholesaler e.g 5% on home usage material like t.v , fridge, fan etc ,auto, electrical, electronic parts 15%to25% on bike ,car ,bungalow, tobacco products etc. (2) manufacturer pay 1.5% tx on lending cost &1.5% on selling cost (3) wholesaler ,retailer pay 1.5% on lending cost & more next
Dear pm
Since I did not find place to give my out look after I attended your public speach in our bangalore national college grounds on lpg subsidy surrender by 2 kakh subscribers
Can our finance dept think of givin additional rebet of Rs. 207 x 6 cylinders amunting to approx 1250 per annum who ever checks in in as subsidy not required
Or all citizens filing it returns have option of getting additional tax benifit of Rs. 1250 if subsidy is not availed
Regards
M S ARUN KUMAR
While reading about Satyam management getting convicted, brought a sense of relief. However, it was painful to observe, that investors who lost their money were not compensated.
Fine imposed on Ramalinga Raju is too less compared to the losses incurred by the exchequer.
It is high time SEBI should facilitate bringing in "Investor Compensation Act". This will protect the Indian investors in case a company faults or frauds. Govt. should introduce this as a ‘Bill’ in next session.
encouraging russia to build more civil nuclear reactors in india
100% f.d.i should be impiemented for nuciear reactors for civil nuclear power
Every TV or Media channel must dedicate space and time for Public broadcasting as a part of their CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility).
Participative Democracy is the real solution to India s growth. We need to have a participative administative/ implementing machinary. One need to check the mindset of Govt. machinary ( till the last member of machinary) make them participative in implementing.. ( they may dare to take good decisions ) and see the differance. there are examples where the schemes go suceessful where the buracrats make everyone participative..The model should be followed everywhere.
Sir,
I had carried out my house renovation recently. I had incurred close to Rs 2.5 Lacs in renovation which was paid entirely in cash since the vendors refuse to accept cheque or card payment for supply of materials or labour. The material as well as labor cost was invariably quoted without any tax to make it low and competitive. I suggest that all transactions above Rs 10000 should be compulsorily made in card or cheque so these incomes are routed thru bank and become part of national income.
The government should reserve a certain percentage for the new entrepreneurs in the budget. Collect the business plan from young entrepreneurs who have the passion and potential, from all states,choose the best among them and provide all the support to start up. This will inspire the youngsters to concentrate on this it will help our country in increased GDP and best economic growth. Our nations great resources are youth. We should utilize our resources rather than other countries do.