News regarding observing December 25 as good governance day

Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu on Tuesday said no force will be applied for observing good governance day on December 25. Wishing all “Merry Christmas” and Happy New Year, he said people are free to celebrate December 25 in “whatever manner they like”.

December 25, birthday of former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Madan Mohan Malaviya, is being observed as good governance day by the NDA government.

“National function of good governance day is being observed on December 25 and all central ministers will participate in public functions in their respective states and MPs will go to their constituencies,” Naidu said.

He said, “Departments will conduct the functions. There is no force (on anyone). People are free to celebrate in whatever manner they like.”

Dismissing the controversy over the event as a “non-issue”, he said, “Unfortunately some people have created issue out of a non-issue forgetting the fact such circulars were issued in the past when they were in power. Click to read

New Delhi: If a consensus is arrived at among the ministers, Christmas this year may well become a working day for BJP-led NDA government at the Centre. The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) is learnt to have sent out a wish list to the ministers saying they consider making Christmas, which also happens to be former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s 90th birthday and has already been declared as Good Governance Day, a working day for the Centre.

Sources said the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) is likely to send out a circular suggesting the activities for the government departments on Christmas. The circular may recommend the departments to organize events like visiting sensitive areas or carrying out cleanliness drives, the sources said.

Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani had courted controversy over a circular by Navodya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS) asking all its schools to observe December 25 — Christmas day — as ‘Good Governance Day’ that led to an uproar in Parliament. Read more on IBN

Press Information Bureau 

Government of India

Ministry of Information & Broadcasting 

23-December-2014 16:55 IST

PIB launches webpage on Good Governance 

One stop repository on Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee

Press Information Bureau has launched a webpage to mark ‘Good Governance Day’ on the website of the Bureau. The webpage is one-stop information resource on the former Prime Minister Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee, whose 90th birthday coincides with the Good Governance Day on 25th December. A presentation on the webpage was done to apprise Secretary Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Shri Bimal Julka about the features of the page. Praising the webpage, Shri Julka said “efforts like this are step towards making people aware of the accomplishments of Shri Vajpayee” and hoped that general public, researchers and mediapersons will find the page a valuable resource. 

The webpage contains more than three hundred speeches of the former Prime Minister in both Hindi and English, segregated into themes like governance, education, science and technology and economic reforms. It has archival photographs of the key moments of the life of Shri Vajpayee including his tenure as Foreign Minister and Prime Minister. Another highlight of the page is films made by Films Division and Doordarshan on Shri Vajpayee. The page also provides video links to many key speeches of Shri Vajpayee. On the Audio front, the page carries ‘Kaljayi Swar Sampada’ comprehensive collection of Shri Vajpayees representative moments including his poetry, prepared by All India Radio. 

Keeping in the spirit of Good Governance Day, the page carries links to videos on best practices in governance, compilation of award winning case studies in innovative governance. The webpage also carries features written by senior journalists, close colleagues of Shri Vajpayee. 

The page carries sharable links for different social media platforms. There is a subject specific twitter widget to provide stream on the hashtag #GoodGovernanceDay. 

Additional Secretary Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Shri Jitendra Shankar Mathur and Director General PIB, Shri Frank Noronha were also present on the occasion. The webpage can be accessed at http://pib.nic.in/goodgov.

GURGAON/NEW DELHI: Christmas will not be a holiday for government employees in Haryana. Instead, December 25, which is also the birthday of former PM Atal Behari Vajpayee, will be observed as ‘Good Governance and Cleanliness Day’ in the state, triggering speculation if the Centre and other BJP-ruled states would follow suit. 

“We received a communication from the urban local bodies department, saying that a cleanliness drive will be launched at the district as well as block level on December 25. All offices will remain open on that day, as they were on October 2, Gandhi Jayanti. I do not expect schools to remain open, but if they wish to, it is entirely up to them. There is no official order for them to remain open,” Gurgaon deputy commissioner T L Satyaprakash told TOI on Monday. 

Additional deputy commissioner Vinay Pratap Singh assigned duties to various officials on Monday. “The state government is going to launch the ‘CM window’ on that day as well, to establish better coordination between the government and the public using information technology,” he said. It was unclear if the Manohar Lal Khattar government had acted on its own and scrapped the gazetted holiday. 

Meanwhile, the department of electronics and information technology (DeitY) has announced an event to mark Good Governance Day on December 25, even as the Centre is yet to firm up its overall plan for the day. 

A senior IAS officer indicated that DeitY has sent out a communication to government officials regarding the event titled ‘Good Governance through e-Governance’, which will comprise the main function with minister for communications & IT Ravi Shankar Prasad as the chief guest, and an exhibition to be held between 10.45am and 5pm. The mail invites the officers to participate by offering suggestions on e-governance and visiting the exhibition. However, the officer said the participation is meant to be voluntary. 

Recently, a circular from the HRD ministry asking schools to observe Good Governance Day by organizing various events like debates had kicked up a storm, with the Opposition parties criticizing the alleged move to keep schools open on Christmas holiday. The government had, however, denied any plans to make the day a working day for schools and other educational institutions. 

Incidentally, the DoPT has not put out any circular yet indicating how Good Governance Day is to be celebrated by various government ministries and departments. 

There is speculation that government employees may have to report to work on Christmas holiday to be part of government’s Good Governance Day celebrations. “So far, no formal communication to this effect has been put out by the DoPT,” a senior officer said. Click to read