Kathmandu, September 4

Hello Sarkar, a grievance-hearing mechanism of the government, has settled as many as 43,645 grievances that the authorities received from the public in the fiscal 2015/16, according to the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers.

The grievance-hearing mechanism was set up in November, 2011 in order to provide the general public with an easy access to concerned authorities. According to the OPMCM, as many as 43,545 complaints of the 4,719 registered with the mechanism have been resolved.

The number of complaints registered by the public with Hello Sarkar has gone up mainly because of the use of social networking site and the trust people have in it for prompt redressal, OPMCM claimed.

The government had officially launched Hello Sarkar’s Facebook and Twitter pages last year. The public can post their grievances and suggestions on the pages. However, it continues to receive complaints via its hotline- 1111.

The OPMCM has deputed 16 employees to run Hello Sarkar. “The employees receive the complaints via social networking sites, telephone calls, and email, and forward it to the concerned authorities.

If any office delays or fails to settle the complaints under its jurisdiction, we write to its ministry to initiate action against the concerned office in-charge,” said the OPMCM, adding that outstanding complaints were also under the process of being heard as per the laws.

Most complaints lodged with Hello Sarkar were seasonal and situational in nature, such as shortage of fuel, black marketing, embezzlement in relief distribution to earthquake survivors, load-shedding, irregular drinking water supply, corruption, foreign employment fraud, overcharging of transport fare, air pollution, poor road infrastructures, shortage of school textbooks, and delay in distribution of first trance of housing grant to earthquake victims among others.

The Ministry of Home Affairs, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development, the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport, the Nepal Electricity Authority, and the Ministry of Finance are among the government offices receiving majority of complaints through Hello Sarkar.