Bhubaneswar: The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) and Bhubaneswar Smart City Ltd (BSCL) have roped in school children to make Bhubaneswar take the lead in the ongoing Ease of Living Citizens Perception Survey, launched by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), said an official release.
Homework for parents! Sounds strange, but for the Ease of Living Citizens Perception Survey, the city authorities have roped in school kids with this innovative approach so that more and more people would respond to this survey.
According to a statement of BSCL, The Citizen Perception Survey is an interface through which citizens of 100 Smart Cities of India are getting a chance to rate their own cites on various Ease Of Living (EOL) parameters like education, health, cleanliness, garbage collection, drinking water, water logging, rental housing, commutation, women safety, emergency services, livelihood opportunities, recreational facilities, cost of living, financial services, air quality, green cover, electricity supply etc.
The survey, which has already started on February 1, will continue till February 29 and a citizen can go and click at the link http://eol2019.org/Citizenfeedback to submit his/her ratings. During the process the citizen has to fill his/her name, phone number and click one of the several answers given in the choice to rate their city’s facilities and services.
While through the homework for parents the students in various schools are targeted to take the information sheets home so that their fathers and mothers could respond to the survey, other strategies like videos at major LED display boards, briefing sessions at offices of BMC, BDA and BSCL, campaigns through educational institutions, kiosks at the ongoing Park Utsav venues, talk shows organized at city-based FM radio stations, social media campaigns, SMS campaigns, volunteers carrying placards in order to motivate public in public places, slum dwellers’ involvement through Peer Leaders (Pragati Sathis) and hoardings at strategic locations by BMC have given a boost to Ease of Living Citizens Perception Survey across the city as the Temple City is all charged up to repeat its feat of Smart City Challenge once again.
It can be mentioned here that through a similar multi-prong strategy thousands took part in various Citizen-centric responses during the Smart City Challenge during 2015-’16 and the Smart City Proposal of Bhubaneswar became the Number One in the nation with its child-friendly outlook.
So far teams from BMC, BSCL and BDA have visited different colleges such as Swosti School of Hotel Management, Srusti College of Management, and Silicon Engineering College etc. Awareness workshops were organized in these in order to sensitize the students to take part in this survey.
Similarly, under the “Homework for parents” strategy students of Modern English School were given the “homework” to get the survey filled by their parents. The teams have also organised two radio shows, one each on 104 Radio Chocolate and 93.5 Red FM to create awareness among the youth.