Satark Nagrik Sangathan

An initiative to promote transparency and accountability in government functioning

The world's largest democracy is soon going to polls again. Citizens will vote to elect their representatives to the Parliament of the country yet most citizens are unaware of even the roles and responsibilities of these representatives. Most people have no idea of what their elected representatives do once they vote them into power.

In this scenario participatory democracy remains just rhetoric. People are not able to meaningfully engage with their elected representative and therefore development needs have remained largely unaddressed even after 60 years of independence. Misuse of power, ineffective governance and corruption have come to characterise politics in India. Public perception is that all politicians are corrupt.

In order to address this asymmetry of information and to assess the performance of individual Members of Parliament, Satark Nagrik Sangathan has developed Report Cards using information obtained under the RTI Act. Each Report Card assesses the performance of the MP on the basis of the following three objective parameters linked to their primary roles and responsibilities:

Performance in the Lok Sabha- As members of the Lok Sabha, MPs are responsible for passing bills (laws) for the country, monitoring the functioning of the executive, approving the budget and discussing issues of public importance. For the Report Card t he performance of MPs in the Lok Sabha has been assessed on the basis of the number of sittings that they attended, the number of questions they raised, the number of times they participated in the proceedings and the number of bills they introduced. The questions raised by them and their participation in the proceedings has also been analysed issue-wise to gauge the priorities of the MP. This information has been collated for their performance across all 3 sessions (Budget, Monsoon and Winter sessions) of the Lok Sabha held in 2007.

Performance in Parliamentary Standing Committees- The work done by the Parliament is not only varied and complex in nature, but also considerable in volume. The Parliament cannot, therefore, give close consideration to all matters that come up before it. A good deal of its business is, therefore, transacted in Committees of the House, known as Parliamentary Committees. For the purpose of the Report Cards, the membership of each MP in the Parliamentary Standing Committees has been compiled from 2004 to 2008. These Committees are permanent and regular committees. The Financial Committees, Departmentally Related Standing Committees and some other Committees come under the category of Parliamentary Standing Committees.

In the Report Cards, the performance of MPs in Parliamentary Standing Committees has been assessed on the basis of the number of committee meetings that the MP attended in 2007. Attendance of MPs in Financial and Departmentally Related Standing Committees meetings has been compiled.

Performance in allocation of MPLADS- Under the MPLAD scheme each MP is allocated Rs. 2 crores per year to carry out development works in their constituency. An analysis of all the projects sanctioned by the MP from the MPLADS between 2004 and 2008 has been used as an indicator of the performance of the MP.

Information used in the Report Cards has been obtained using the RTI Act and Government websites. Report Cards on the MPs from the Hindi speaking states of UP, Bihar, Uttarakhand, Delhi, Haryana and Jharkhand have been developed. In addition, Report Cards of prominent MPs from all major national political parties have been developed.

Satark Nagrik Sangathan is partnering with the media to disseminate these report cards. Starting from the 9 th of February, Hindustan Times (Hindi) has been presenting these Report Cards and will carry Report Cards of over 200 prominent MPs till the Lok Sabha elections.

Prior to the Delhi Assembly Elections in 2008, SNS developed Report Cards to assess the performance of all 70 MLAs in Delhi . The parameters of the Report Cards were evolved on the basis of the stated roles and responsibilities of MLAs. Information on each parameter was obtained using the RTI Act. SNS had partnered with the Times of India and Hindustan to disseminate the MLA Report Cards. At many places, people used these Report Cards to meaningfully engage with their MLA to address the development needs of the constituency.