RTE portal

To increase citizen participation in governance and to make decisionmaking and policy implementation more transparent and accountable, a new RTE portal has been launched with the collaboration of FICCI and Delhi-based think-tanks Centre for Civil Society (CCS) and the Centre Square Foundation (CSF).

"The work for the portal began in March 2010. At that time we could only provide some information on the portal but we thought that there were a lot many challenges not just to know about what the law is or what the court judgments are and other things such as recognition norms, 25% reservation , school management committees , etc, and so we decided to revamp the portal," said Parth J Shah, president , Centre for Civil Society.

The portal is more focused on engagement as there is a user forum and a grievance redressal option that people can use. "We are hoping that we will learn from the portal and it will be used towards reform. The portal will be a platform, which will make it easier for people to know what is happening and what they could do. Through this knowledge, citizens would be able to effectively engage with the government ," he added.

The portal includes state specific information , which would inform people about the status of implementation of the RTE Act in each state, information on how to file grievances with local authority , etc, high court judgments related to RTE Act, case studies, video of Parliamentary debates, success stories, and so on. "We have provided contact details of the concerned people with whom society can get in touch to address individual problems. If no action is taken, we will compile a list of problems and give them to the concerned authority," he concluded.

Read the story in The Times of India