Volunteer Ahmedabad, Indicorps & Research Foundation for Governance in India have collaborated with the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation on a Governance Project, as part of the Youth Leadership Course. The duration of the progamme is six weeks, from 1 May to 15 June 2009.The aim of the governance project is for the youth (between 18 to 25 years) to better understand overall structure of governance within the country, with special emphasis on local governance and the processes involved with the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC). Over the course of the six-week programme, the participating youth would be able learn about aspects of citizenship and democracy as well as about the functioning of the AMC. As part of the project, they will also contribute to the society by creating awareness about their learnings to the local population as well as trying to solve their Corporation’s work related problems.
The programme begins with a week-long introductory orientation course for the participants in order that they better understand the basics of national, state-level and local governance as well as about fundamental rights, human rights and the Right to Information Act. From the second week onwards, the team starts working in the field – in different Ward Offices, City Civic Centres and Departments of the AMC to understand various issues that the Corporation addresses day-to- day. This involves: observing Ward officials at work, observing how different department offices run, shadowing officials as they go into the field to handle complaints/issues and how the complaints/issues finally get resolved. For example, if the water department has to handle a water leakage/shortage in the city, the participants understand how water gets supplied to different parts of city, shadow municipality workers addressing the problem in the field and in the process, learn how other citizens with similar problems can be helped. In the same way, the team also works with the City Civic Center to understand the processes on which the Center functions and to raise awareness in the city about the functions and workings of these centres. The team also spends considerable time meeting and interacting with different sections of the society about their needs and problems.The overall objective of the programme is to work as a platform for the youth to understand the structure of our government and the processes of governance better. It is imperative that students, at a young age, understand our system and how it works so that they can be active participants of an engaging democracy in future.