Citizen charter

Citizen charter

The Citizens’ Charter is an instrument which seeks to make an organization transparent, accountable and citizen friendly. A Citizens’ Charter is basically a set of commitments made by an organization regarding the standards of service which it delivers. Every citizens’ charter has several essential components to make it meaningful; the first being the Vision and Mission Statement of the organization. This gives the outcomes desired and the broad strategy to achieve these goals and outcomes. This also makes the users aware of the intent of their service provider and helps in holding the organization accountable. Secondly, in its Citizens’ Charter, the organization must state clearly what subjects it deals with and the service areas it broadly covers. This helps the users to understand the type of services they can expect from a particular service provider. These commitments/promises constitute the heart of a citizens’ charter. Even though these promises are not enforceable in a court of law, each organization should ensure that the promises made are kept and, in case of default, a suitable compensatory/remedial mechanism should be provided. Thirdly, the Citizens’ Charter should also stipulate the responsibilities of the citizens in the context of the charter.

Background

The Citizens’ Charter, when introduced in the early 19 90’s, represented a landmark shift in the delivery of public services. The emphasis of the Citizens’ Charter is on citizens as customers of public services. The Citizens’ Charter scheme in its present form was first launched in 1991 in the UK. The aim was to ensure that public services are made responsive to the citizens they serve.

A Citizens’ Charter is a public statement that defines the entitlements of citizens to a specific service, the standards of the service, the conditions to be met by users, and the remedies available to the latter in case of non-compliance of standards. The Charter concept empowers the citizens in demanding committed standards of service. Thus, the basic thrust of Citizens’ Charter is to make public services citizen centric by ensuring that these services are demand driven rather than supply driven. In this context, the six principles of the Citizens’ Charter movement as originally framed were:

Quality : improving the quality of services;

Choice : for the users wherever possible;

Standards : specifying what to expect within a time frame;

 Value : for the taxpayers’ money;

Accountability : of the service provider (individual as well as Organization);

Transparency : in rules, procedures, schemes and grievance redressal.

These were revised in 1998 as nine principles of service delivery in the following manner:

• Set standards of service;
• Be open and provide full information;
• Consult and involve;
• Encourage access and promote choice;
• Treat all fairly;
• Put things right when they go wrong;
• Use resources eff ectively;
• Innovate and improve; and
• Work with other providers

Government of India in 1996 commenced a National Debate for Responsive Administration. A major suggestion which emerged was bringing out Citizen Charters for all public service organisations.  idea received strong support at the Chief Ministers’ Conference in May 1997; one of the key decisions of the Conference was to formulate and operationalise Citizens’ Charters at the Union and State Government levels in sectors which have large public interface such as Railways, Telecom, Post & Public Distribution Systems, Hospitals, and the Revenue & Electricity Departments. momentum for this was provided by the Department of Administrative Reforms & Public Grievances (DAR&PG) in consultation with the Department for Consumer Affairs. Department of AR & PG simultaneously formulated guidelines for structuring a model charter as well as a list of do’s and don’ts to enable various government departments to bring out focused and effective charters. Since May 1997, when the programme was launched in India, different Ministries, Departments, Directorates and other