Dear Shri Joseph,
Warm Greetings for a Happy New Year!
December 12th, 2006, marked one year of the historic MoU for Good City Governance that was signed between MCGM and the NGO Council.
During this past one year, much has been achieved by the MoU, that enabled collaborative and co-operative working between civil society and government, and which greatly benefited citizens in understanding and working with BMC. One of the significant learnings of this period has been that the city’s problems and the issues that affect its citizens cannot be solved by Government alone, and that appropriate and sustainable solutions to these can be found only when civil society and government join hands and strengthen each other.
This is the real value that the MoU has, and as this path-breaking initiative was taken by the BMC under your leadership, and it has shown significant results, we urge the BMC to implement the MoU in both letter and spirit and engage actively with the NGO Council to jointly address issues that most affect citizens.
In the past year, the NGO Council has also collaborated with other organisations, including some Government agencies, such as the Anti Corruption Bureau, under a Mumbai-Pact Against Corruption Program, that uses community participation to fight against corruption.
We were also invited by the major political parties (the Congress and the BJP) to contribute suggestions for a Citizens’ Manifesto for the upcoming BMC Elections in Feb. 2007.
As per Clause 20 of the MoU between MCGM & NGO Council, “there shall be a yearly review of the implementation of this MoU and the contents of the review shall be made public.”
(full text of MOU available at
(www.karmayog.com/ngocouncil/moumcgm.htm)
The first 6 Month Review (for the period December 2005 to May 2006) of the MCGM-NGO Council MoU as conducted by the Additional Municipal
Commissioner (City) is available at:
http://www.karmayog.com/ngocouncil/ngocouncilreview.htm
For the period June 2006 – December 2006, the following internal review was prepared by the NGO Council, and the same is enclosed for your reference.
The NGO Council would like to meet you at your convenience to discuss the review and to plan initiatives for the upcoming year.
Yours sincerely,
Vinay R. Somani
Convenor
NGO Council