Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal (File | PTI)
NEW DELHI: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday launched his government’s ambitious programme of providing 40 essential services at the doorstep of the people. In the first phase of the scheme, Delhiites just need to dial ‘1076’ to avail doorstep delivery of services, which will be available from 8 am to 10 pm. The call centre, however, would be reachable round-the-clock.
As per the initial numbers provided by the Delhi government, a total of 21,000 calls were received, but only 1,286 were answered due to heavy traffic. As many as 369 appointments were fixed till 6 pm in the evening on the first day of the launch. The door-step delivery (DSD) scheme was launched with much fanfare via video conferencing at various government offices. Live telecast of the programme took place at 58 different locations, including constituency-level Aam Aadmi Party offices, across Delhi.
“Till now we had heard about the home delivery of pizza. From today, the people of Delhi will have the government at their doorsteps through a phone call. This is called a government that is in place to serve the people,” said Kejriwal. The CM, who is constantly monitoring the functioning of the DSD scheme, also decided to scale up the operations by increasing the number of operators from 40 to 80.
“Looking at the huge number of calls on the first day, the number of operators has been increased. The CM is keeping is monitoring the data on an hourly basis,” said a Delhi government official. A private company, VFS Global, is providing the trained staff and is also ensuring technical support to the massive digital project. As of now, the city has been divided into 11 districts, with each having one team of five ‘Mobile Sahayaks and a supervisor.
