Kothagudem: Dial your Collector from home from today

Kothagudem: In the wake of Covid--19 spreading, Bhadradri-Kothagudem district administration took an innovative decision to introduce "Dial your Collector from home' programme from Monday (November 9) instead of Grievance Day, which will be conducted on every Monday at the Collectorate.

It should be reminded here that grievance day programme was stopped due to lockdown. But the problems were increasing in villages, mandals and divisions and people do not know where to go to solve their problems.

District Collector MV Reddy took the decision to avoid mass gathering and reduce transport expenditure to the people.

People can call to the given phone number and can tell their problems. Perhaps Kothagudem is the first one to introduce this new programme across the State.

Collector MV Reddy said the pandemic is increasing day-by-day in the district despite taking all precautions.

At this junction, mass gathering at one place is not good and it may lead to spreading of the virus. "Hence, we decided to introduce a new programme from Monday in the district. Another reason for taking this decision is the district has spread widely when compared to other districts and most of the population is tribal," he added.

He said that they have observed mostly tribal people are coming from far off places like 100 to 150 km distance for reporting even minor issues and problems, which were not solved at mandal-level, during the Grievance Day at the Collectorate in Kothagudem on every Monday.

It was also noticed most of the tribals and others are very poor and even couldn't afford transport charges and had to travel three to four hours from their places to district headquarters, the Collector said.

Keeping all these issues in mind, it was decided to conduct 'Dial your Collector from home'. All district-level officials including the Collector will sit at the Collectorate from 11 am to 1 pm on every Monday and receive calls from petitioners. Petitioners could tell their problems by dialling to 08744 - 244888.

Once the problem was reported, it will be diverted to the department concerned and will be solved, he explained. Tribal associations welcomed the district administration's decision and said it will help people mainly tribals in solving their problems.

Sonde Veeraiah, Adivasi Samkshema Parishad State convener said the decision is very helpful to the tribal people.