The line-1916-was set up by the BMC two years ago so that people did not have to visit the local ward to file a complaint. Between August 2007 and August 2008, the BMC received 2.94 lakh complaints through 1916; of these, it claims to have redressed 2.20 lakh. “Around 75% of the complaints filed during this period have been redressed and 73,378 complaints are yet to resolved,” said a civic official. But considering that the city has a population of 12.7 million (2001 census) and the BMC touches every aspect of a citizen’s life, one would expect there would be more complaints.
“A majority of the calls are about garbage not being removed, unauthorised constructions and hawker nuisance,” said Vilas Vaidya, in charge of the BMC’s Disaster Management Cell, which records the calls.
BJP corporator Ashish Shelar said the low number of complaints was owing to the fact that a majority of the people do not feel things will change. “These people have got accustomed to living with the difficulties. Then, there is another section that feels that filing a complaint is a waste of time as it will not even be looked at. There are some who want to file a complaint, but do not know how to. It is only about 2% who actually complain,” he said. Shelar added that he rarely receives a complaint on SMS but when he does, he ensures it is acted upon.
Karmayog, a non-governmental organisation that works on civic issues, is trying to ensure that more people utilise the facility to better the city. “Many times, the BMC does not have information about specific problems such as location of open manholes. If each of us informs the BMC when one comes across any problems or has any observations, suggestions, questions, information, it will help the corporation in improving the city,” said Vinay Somani, the founder of Karmayog.
Somani added people can send also send an SMS to their local corporator. The NGO has put up the mobile numbers of all corporators on its website (www.karmayog.org/mumbaiwards).
Congress corporator Pramod Mandrekar, who represents the upmarket Malabar Hill area, said people sometimes come to the ward to complain or when they meet him on his rounds. “Many call up but rarely do people send an SMS,” he said.