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Speech by Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP and Chairman, Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009 at launch of NBAG 2009, 13th October 2009. |
Justice Rama Jois, Hon’ble MP, Justice Santosh Hegde, Hon’ble Lokayukta, my fellow Jury members of the Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009, Friends from the Media , Ladies and Gentlemen
Firstly thank you for being here today at the formal launch of the Namma Bengaluru Awards 2009 process. The 2009 awards will be the first of an annual process of recognizing and rewarding the people from different walks of life in our city – who are contributing to make this city a better city for all those who live here.
We have a detailed presentation for all of you about these awards – About what this means and how is it relevant to all of us as citizens of this great city!
But before that, I would like to establish the context and background in which , the idea of these awards was born.
As has been discussed innumerable times, we are all very dis-satisfied with the way our city has developed over the last many years – and evolved into a full blown urban chaos with an increasing challenging urban environment for all, made even more severe and challenging for the less fortunate sections of our city and society, the consequent loss and disappearance of our heritage and increasingly fragile environment eco system with thinning green cover and depleting water table etc.!
When some of us took on the challenge of putting the cities development back on track and in a direction that all of us would be happy with – it became clear that there were five components to that the solution
| 1. | Blueprint for development that addressed all issues and all people. |
| 2. | A more responsive, transparent and citizen centric City government with a law that guaranteed that. |
| 3. | Finances and money for implementing |
| 4. | Creating the capacity in our public agencies and government to handle the execution of the plan |
| 5. | Finally ensuring that there was always a cadre of citizens – in public life, government service, amongst citizen and corporate that are motivated, driven and recognized to serve the city and its people – something that would also bring back the sense of community, belonging and citizenship in our city. |
Over the last 8 months or so, we have managed to find solutions to the challenges of planning, reforming city legislation and government, financing and capacity creation – which leaves the last and most critical aspect of recognizing and rewarding the real do-ers of the city! And that brings to this program.
The Namma Bengaluru awards is intended to be a sustainable institutionalized platform that will every year recognize and reward excellent, commitment, integrity and citizenship in public and private life. While looking around us, it seems sometimes that these values have completely disappeared from our city. And so while it is true that there are many crooked and callous people in public life, citizenry and business, there are also many others where values of public service, integrity, citizenship are alive and well - in thousands of citizens and public officials.
The Namma Bengaluru Awards will be our way of saying a Thank you to all of these ‘real stars’ of our city. I expect that these Awards will foster Civic pride and community ownership and promote a culture of excellence and strengthen the partnership between citizens and Civic agencies/NGOs/RWAS/Corporates etc . Such a partnership between citizens and all other participants in our city is key to a sustainable and strong future for our city.
I believe it’s time for all of us to work together to bring back the sense of belonging in our city and so it would very appropriate for us to recognize those in the various Government, Civic agencies, NGOs, RWAs, Corporates that have been working to keep the spirit of Bengaluru alive despite these growth challenges. To ensure that this is done every year sustainably, a non-profit trust has been formed called the Namma Bengaluru Foundation that will have a corpus to fund the communication and organizational costs of this program every year.
Media must play an important role in this – in starting to move the spotlight to the real do-ers of this city- For too long the debate and focus in the city has been predominantly on the media savvy , smooth talking, hyperbole ridden, publicity hungry stars of the city – this is doing an injustice to the many thousands who silently toil away – driven only by a commitment to the city and its people – Its time the some of spotlight was on them – as a start at least once a year through these awards and hopefully over time, the spotlight of these examples of city service and citizenship will encourage more and more people to do the right thing by the city.
The process will be simple, the people of Bengaluru nominate the candidates and the Namma Bengaluru Awards Jury will decide – The jury as you will see has been selected from amongst the committed and passionate citizens of this city – all of whom have a track record of service and excellence! I thank them all for agreeing to be part of the jury and giving us their time. The process of selection will be a transparent process overseen by a reputed Audit firm and will awards will be distributed in a cultural and Entertainment evening of celebration in mid-December.
Bengaluru will be the first city in the country to have such awards – Bengaluru has always been a pioneer in many ways and I am sure with all your support and involvement that we will be setting the standard for citizenship and excellence in public service in coming years! I look forward to you and the entire city getting involved in these awards and making these awards a significant annual event in the process of building the city of our dreams! I look forward to the media especially, to communicate this to your readers and viewers far and wide.
Thank you,
Jai Hind Jai Karnataka