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Civic body goes `wiki', PMC To Upload Information On Web Encyclopaedia; Staff Being Trained
By Mrs Gupta, Section Computer Gupshup
The civic officials are getting webfriendly. Citizens can soon find information about Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) projects on the popular website, Wikipedia, the online free open content encyclopaedia.
The PMC's head of departments and engineers are being trained in batches to use the Wiki software, which will enable them to post pages on Wikipedia and learn to modify them. Around 70 officials have already been trained. Within the PMC, the Wiki software is already in use for monitoring the status of hundreds of PMC projects on a daily basis. The move was initiated by the chief information officer (CIO), Anupam Saraph, with an aim to create an easy and quick way of correspondence between officials within the PMC. "Using Wiki is an easy way of keeping in touch with various departments. We have created several `Wikis' to connect different people and projects within the PMC," Saraph sad. He explained, saying, "Many departments are involved in one project and are linked to each other. Because of lack of communication, deadline pressure and other constraints, these departments are unaware of what the others are doing. And, therefore, a Wiki -- a set of web pages that users can edit and thus keep others updated -- is the answer to better co-ordination." Click on "Full Story" for more...
"There is an enthusiastic response from the officials and they are experimenting by creating pages, contributing to pages created by others and experiencing the way on-line collaboration works. Once this grows into a serious culture, we plan to create Wikis that citizens can contribute to," Saraph said.
He pointed out that the Wiki culture has to be built in the PMC first, and that slowly others should also be encouraged to participate. "Wiki is extensively used by corporates to promote collaboration and create negotiations on complex issues. It is a basic model of governance and I want to encourage other authorities, like RTO and district collectorate to use it as a common platform to discuss the development of the city," Saraph said. When asked about the authenticity of the Wiki articles, Saraph said that Wiki is an editable but self-correcting website. "Collaboration culture requires mutual respect and a neutral point-of-view. On a wiki, every contributor can opt to be informed of any edit to the page they are interested in. This allows the contributors to review the content, enforce a neutral point-of-view and quickly correct errors. So, while it is possible for anybody to place incorrect or inflammatory articles, those interested in the article can quickly correct it. A Wiki is, therefore, able to generate ideas and consensus in a democratic way, with mutual respect and with a neutral point of view," Saraph said. Speaking to TOI, municipal commissioner Pravinsinh Pardeshi applauded the move. "It will allow officials to share exact information about projects instead of spending a lot of time in meetings for the same purpose. Work gets held up as many departments are involved and all have to come for meetings. Monitoring of projects will also be easier," Pardeshi said.
Source: Times News Network, March-24-2008
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