Guntur: The online Parishkaram (solution) portal started by the Guntur district administration remains a non-starter, since the mobile number on which people can file complaints, has been almost continuously switched off.
Ideally, the number should be handy for people who want to lodge complaints over revenue, land, civil supplies, Aadhaar, MeeSeva, legal metrology, direct benefit transfer or other services in the Parishkaram.
Since it remains continuously switched off, the very concept behind the Parishkaram online cell to receive grievances through a simple phone call and save valuable time of the public is defeated. The number works, but only once or twice a month, that too for only about an hour.
Besides this, there is no facility of lodging complaints through emails.
The best the people can do is to rush to district headquarters Guntur every Monday to air their grievances. As many as 48 lakh people live in 728 revenue villages, 11 towns and one municipal corporation of the 57 mandals in the district.
The Parishkaram was initiated to ease the difficulties of these people.
“Why go to such trouble? Why select a number that is easy to remember, publicise it, and then leave it in neglect? It is almost always switched off, when it should have been working round-the-clock,” said Y. Saibabu, a clerk.
“I lodged a complaint about the non-functioning number, in the feedback column, but to no avail,” he continued.
Interestingly, people are now lodging complaints in the feedback column, but there is still no attempt by the district administration to restore the services.
M. Vinay said that the GMC has been receiving complaints through email but this facility was absent in the Parishkaram.
The status report of Parishkaram website say that so far, 977 complaints have been received, 500 resolved and the rest are under various stages of follow up.
A revenue department official, on condition of anonymity, admitted that 9866992627 is indeed switched off.
