Just a few weeks back, I had a group activity in school regarding our Civics textbook. We were supposed to do a Role play on “Our Participation in the Society”. First, we had to identify a local problem affecting the society and show how the problem could be solved by people’s participation. We showed this through a skit. We took a problem that the buildings of a colony were very old and were about to collapse. The skit showed how people could solve this problem by going to Government officials together. It was a nice idea. What if this really happened….
If our area or colony is facing a major problem – like the gutters dirty or the roads are not clean - we just say “That’s such a dirty road. Don’t go from there. It smells.”
Do WE ever do anything about it? Do we at least pick up the litter that we have thrown? Instead of just leaving the roads and gutters smelling like that, we could participate in the problem and help solve it. We – the common people – can come together and go to government authorities who are responsible for the problem. If there is no response from the Government, people can come together and arrange a peaceful rally. We can also include the media if we want to. There are chances that the problem could be solved then.
Even the Government has taken initiative to help common people in such situations. It has introduced what is called the “Right to Information” (RTI). For this, we have to fill a particular form and ask for the information that we need and post it to RTI department. After a few days, we get the information that we wanted. Though not many people are aware of this, but it is quite a successful initiative. Due to this, the people’s participation increases. Through RTI, common people can question various government departments and agencies and push them to solve our problems.
With this, we – common people- can bring about a great change in the society. All we have to do is take initiative to solve the problem, and things aren’t that hard then!
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