Come Thursday, an MCD official will be penalised if he or she does not move your application for a birth certificate for more than seven days or delays the booking of a park by more than a day.

The MCD today announced that six services -- issuance of birth and death certificates, health trade licence, park booking, community hall booking, general trade licence and factory licence -- will have to be delivered in a time-frame, failing which officials are liable to penalty.

It will come into effect from September 15 when the e-Service Level Agreement shall be implemented in MCD under 'The Delhi (Right of Citizen to Time Bound Delivery of Services) Act, 2011'.

The announcement came close on the heels of the Delhi government announcing a list of 32 services which will now have to be delivered within a specified time.

From the six services, the Registration of Births and Deaths is a service, which has already been implemented as an e-SLA by the Corporation. A senior MCD official said that for the period from July 10, 2010 to September 8, 2011, MCD has issued 6,82,652 certificates.

"The MCD is determined to bring more and more of its services under e-SLAs and eventually bringing all civic services at the doorsteps of citizens. There is recognition of the fact that the citizens have as much right to receive the services within the stipulated time-frame as the civic employees have a duty to deliver," mayor Rajni Abbi said.

She said while on the one hand the officials will be legally bound to deliver services within the stipulated period, on the other hand, citizens will be saved from uncertainty, delay and inconvenience.

With the introduction of e-SLA, citizens would now be able to obtain the services with all convenience and expedition, she added.

The e-SLA empowers the citizen to monitor the status of any application by logging on to the MCD website and after entering the Transaction ID Number of the application.

"If the service is not provided within the specified time-frame, the citizen is entitled to seek a compensatory cost for each day of delay -- at the rate of Rs 10/- per day subject to a maximum of Rs 200 per application -- which shall be payable by the 'Competent Officer' appointed under the Act," a senior MCD official said.

"The power to recover such amount from the defaulting MCD official in respect of each such service also rests with the respective 'competent officer'," the MCD official said.

"But before ordering the recovery, the 'competent officer' will follow a procedure as prescribed in the Act and which includes providing to the defaulting Municipal official notice and opportunity of being heard, consistent with the principles of natural justice."

According to the e-SLAs, the official has to take a decision in one day about applications for park and community hall bookings while an official has to take a decision within 60 days for health trade, general trade and factory licence.