Over 2,000 rules, laws scrapped by Centre in last 9 yrs for ease of governance: Jitendra Singh

Mumbai: Union Minister Jitendra Singh has said more than 2,000 rules and laws were scrapped by the Narendra Modi government in the past nine years for ease of governance and ease of doing business, according to an official statement issued on Sunday.

He said previous governments found "comfort in a status quoist approach", but Prime Minister Modi has demonstrated the courage and conviction to do away with such rules, many of which persisted since the time of British Raj and caused inconvenience to the citizens.

The ultimate aim of good governance is to bring ease of living to the citizens, said the Minister of State for Personnel.

He was speaking as the chief guest after presenting the Yashraj Bharati Samman (YBS) awards at a 'gratitude ceremony' organised by the Yashraj Research Foundation (YRF) here on Saturday night.

He said the three categories in which the awards have been presented, namely innovation in healthcare, transforming people's lives and ethical governance, have always been the priority of the Modi government.

The minister recalled that soon after the government came to power in May 2014, within two to three months, the practice of getting certificates attested by gazetted officers was done away with.

"Thereafter within a year, Prime Minister spoke from the ramparts of Red Fort about the abolition of interview in job recruitment so that a level playing field could be provided. In pension, face recognition technology was introduced so that the elder citizens did not have to go through the tedious process of getting a life certificate," Singh said.

Most of the functioning was converted online and in order to bring in transparency, accountability and citizen participation, the human interface was reduced to the bare minimum, he said.

Talking about public grievance redressal, Singh said that the grievance redressal mechanism was shifted to Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) -- an online platform-- as a result of which about 20 lakh grievances are received every year in comparison to just 2 lakhs every year before this government came in because this government followed a policy of time bound redressal and gained the confidence of the people.

In the field of healthcare, the minister said that use of technology and telemedicine during Covid pandemic has shown how innovation can deliver healthcare in the remote and rural areas.

This government has not only promoted technology and innovation but also StartUps to undertake new innovations even in the health sector thereby transforming lives of citizens, Singh said.

He said that earlier priorities were misplaced and for seventy years it continued to be misplaced because "we were being governed by status quoist governments", according to the Personnel Ministry statement.

But for the first time in 9 years, there is sought to be undone what should have been undone in all these years, it added.