Engineering from Mumbai University, MBA in finance from London Business School, corporate honcho in Siemens and Google, and then a straight dive into municipal politics. Now 38, Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon councillor Nisha Singh zooms in on the outsider-turned-insider perspective of politics and tells Srishti Pandey why and how sitting on the cryptic fence is not going to change our lives.

By Nisha Singh
Six months after completing MBA from London Business School in 2005, I returned to India and joined Google. Besides working in its advertising business, I also headed the company’s corporate social responsibility division – most of our projects were focussed on spreading education. This exposed me to the social sector – the ‘other’ side of life – and that is when I decided this is what I want to do. I quit my job and started working with a few NGOs. Through them, I got opportunities to interact with various schools, and also got the chance to teach underprivileged children.

Education is the most logical way of ensuring development, and this job gave me immense satisfaction of being able to contribute to the society’s progress. I also became a part of the residents’ welfare association (RWA), a task that introduced me to a broad spectrum of civic issues. I had to do a lot of running around – primarily to offices of local authorities such as the Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG) and Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHVBN), among others.

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As we got to understand the system, and the loopholes in it, we engaged in a lot of discussions at our RWA meetings, and that was when some people suggested that I contest the municipal elections. Having toyed with the idea for some time I decided to get into the system. Why? Because I realized that my effectiveness will be enhanced significantly if I had the credibility of being an elected representative. It was 2011, and my life was about to change.

A head-on tackle
Frankly, I would not have been able to even contemplate moving out of the corporate world till about 2009, so the timing is very important. In fact, at times decisions depend on the juncture one has reached in life – and for me the timing was perfect. But if deciding to take the plunge was hard, going through the electoral process to finally win was even harder. For someone like me, who hadn’t really been very conscious of the local politics, chalking out a campaigning strategy itself seemed a daunting task. But then there was one thing that I understood from day one- that just as we advertise/sell branded products/services in the corporate world, politics is about you becoming the brand and then conveying the brand values in an effective manner. I did not rely only on traditional modes of campaigning and concentrated on the social media sphere as well. That gave me wider access to be able to understand the real issues affecting people in Gurgaon.

The insider’s view
The foremost challenge we face every day is lack of empowerment. On paper, we are an ‘urban local body’, which is supposed to look after everyday affairs of the city. In reality, we have been reduced to a sanitation-sewerage-road construction agency because we have the powers to undertake only these functions. Worse, even in these areas development works that require funds of over Rs 1 crore have to be sanctioned by the state government.

For instance, I assumed office in May 2011 and sent a detailed project report to the state government two months later. I sought approval for certain development work in two areas under my jurisdiction, including a village. But the state government would return the file each time, saying it needs a relook. We got the go-ahead for the project only in March this year – and without any actual value-addition. The process not only resulted in delays but also led to an increase in costs because prices of cement, other raw materials and labour have gone up in the interim. So here’s how it works: a file travels through 23 desks for approval, including physical travel to Chandigarh and back because that’s where our state government sits!

The idea for electing a municipal corporation was to have a third level of government so that functions can be run locally, thus ensuring better quality and more accountable governance. Unfortunately, most state governments see cities as golden geese and do not really want to give up the powers they use to control the local authorities.

Second, this laundry list of local authorities that exists is a huge problem. None of these authorities is responsible for the overall development of the city, and each one is run like a small fiefdom. This overlapping and ambiguity of roles leads to the buck not stopping anywhere and residents have to run from pillar to post to get their complaints heard, and addressed. Finally, we have to depend on the state governments for funds. The financial committee of the MCG can sanction projects only up to Rs 1 crore. Beyond that, approvals have to come from the state government. That is one reason why development work takes place in patches. And these compulsions have contributed to the slow pace of progress, rampant corruption and poor governance in most of our cities.

What needs to change
Having been a councillor for two-and-a-half years, I feel the biggest change we need to bring about is to empower the city government. In London, for example, the mayor’s office is the one-stop destination for any issue related to the city – be it construction of a sidewalk or levying congestion tax or making decisions in matters of policing, the city government is responsible and the buck stops there. Further, there is greater degree of transparency as residents are always kept in the loop. World over it has been proven that such local city governments provide more accountable and effective governance and the same needs to be replicated in India.

On paper, we do have similar elected bodies but in reality the mayor and the councillors do not have any major role to play. In fact, most people do not even know who their mayor or councillor is. But to be fair to them, why should they even bother? After all, this bunch of elected representatives cannot be held accountable for most civic issues. And if this continues, no one is going to take interest in contesting for these positions, because even if we want to execute some development work, we can’t.

We also need to focus on how to make city governments self-sufficient so that we don’t have to wait for grants to be sanctioned by state governments. At present, whatever revenue city governments generate by way of various taxes is peanuts. Most of the revenue generated in the city is taken away by state governments to be redistributed in the state. The redistribution argument is fine but then the amount left with the city governments should be enough for them to take up regular development projects.

Frustrating even inside
As an outsider, like everyone else I would go around trashing the system – and by the system I mean the local bodies because these local issues affect us every day. Damaged and congested roads, broken pipelines, traffic snarls, high crime rates – I would blame the city administration for all of that.

Now, having to work within that system with all those restrictions is absolutely frustrating because, as I mentioned earlier, even when I have the intention to do something I have to rely on the whims and fancies of my state government officials. Having said this, I still strongly believe that change can be brought about only from within. It will be a long and arduous journey and one has to be thick-skinned enough to take many bumps on the road but being inside and making changes, however small they may appear, is still better than taking pot shots from the outside.

(This profile appeared in the September 16-30 issue of the magazine)