Aravinda’s Blog

In November in AID Tathagata Sengupta wrote about Right to Information in Purulia .  Now here’s a report by Piyasree Dasgupta in the Indian Express, 6 January 2010.

A website to log the RTI success stories of Purulia villagers Dear Editor, If villages in Purulia can generate so many RTI success stories that they dedicate a website to log them, there is hope for every one of us.  No longer can we say that the system cannot improve.  We can improve it and we must.  Thank you to people of Purulia, Mandra Lion’s Club and the students for taking our government seriously and believing that it can function.  Significant and transformative as this may be, it is but a first step.  We must not rest here, but probe more deeply and consider, for example,  what the PDS is distributing, whether it connects with people’s nutritional, environmental and livelihood needs.

With this promising beginning, if people continue to build faith over the long term, they will gain greater strength not only to access services but to improve them as well.

Aravinda