Geetanjali Krishna: Working the system, effectively

Life in Delhi slums is never easy, everyone knows that. But life in a slum next to a big drain, is worse. By and large, Delhi's drains are large, open (except where people have built homes over them) and bursting with the detritus of city life.

They all get clogged with great regularity, flooding their banks with filthy water. "Our drain," said Ashok, who lives in a slum near the Sheikh Sarai drain, "always stank, often overflowed, and was rarely cleaned."

He recalled how tough it was for them to go to work without getting their clean clothes soaked in sewage, and to even sit inside when their homes were waterlogged.

Last month, the drain got blocked when some civic-minded people offloaded what seemed like a half demolished house into it.

A large group of slum residents lodged a complaint to the MCD about the flood, and the drain was unclogged shortly. The harassed slum dwellers realised this was a shortsighted solution "" within 10 days, the drain clogged again. Again the slum was knee-deep in stinky water.

This time, Ashok and his frustrated neighbours went to a citizen's action group, Satark Nagarik Sangathan (SNS) for help. Together, they used the Right To Information (RTI) Act to question the MCD about its work on the drain "" when was it last cleaned, the officer responsible for it, and the amount spent on its cleaning.

Legally bound to reply, the corporation said that the drain had been last cleaned in June 2004, and was due for cleaning again in May 2005.

Spurred into action by this forced sharing of information, the corporation engineers got the mouth of the drain widened and deepened so that it won't get so frequently clogged in future. Work is still in progress, much to the satisfaction of Ashok and his friends.

"Today, we are confident that we can take on the once-almighty MCD. We want not only what is due to us by the way of public works, but also to see that public money is spent efficiently instead of finding its way into corrupt officials' pockets," said he.

Incidentally, SNS helped formulate another RTI-fuelled inquiry in the neighbourhood. Its activists convinced the affluent Sheikh Sarai residents to file an RTI application seeking access to details of all public works in their area in the past 10 years.

In the process, they discovered the bumpy road that linked their colony to the outer Ring Road was supposed to have been repaved in 2002 "" a Rs 99 lakh contract. But no such work had occurred.

When the uncomfortable questions began, the junior engineer concerned took three days leave, and the bemused residents found that overnight, their bumpy road had a fresh coat of tar.

SNS activists were as happy as the residents about this development, but wanted to ensure that the near Rs 1 crore contract had been properly executed by getting samples of the road tested for strength.

"But it seems that people who pay the most taxes are not interested in finding out whether their money's being used efficiently," said one of the activists wryly, "they say it's enough that their road has been repaired. Unlike the slum people, these well-off people just aren't interested in further ruffling the feathers of MCD officials and contractors, and find out whether the repair work is of an acceptable standard!"

Two victories, one of people like them, the other of people like us. But while everyone has an equal right to information, some obviously seem to want more of it than others.