This Time Don’t Just Vote… Select!

PRLog (Press Release) - Mar 25, 2009 -
Mumbai: In a first for Mumbai, a portal www.MumbaiVotes.com, with the city’s most comprehensive resource for reliable, meticulously researched, and objective information to track promises and performance of the city’s MPs, MLAs and Corporators as well as candidates standing for elections this year, has gone live. MumbaiVotes is currently tracking 915 politicians and has over 3681 newspaper articles, video interviews, election manifestos and legislative records that can be accessed with a simple search. In another first of its kind, different agencies: JaagoRe, Karmayog, AGNI, RUIA-BMM Program, Mumbai University MCJ and KC-BMM department have made this portal a success.

MumbaiVotes is the brain child of political, social and environmental activist, Vivek Gilani. Explaining the inspiration behind the portal, Vivek says, “We want to remove guesswork from the voting process and start a new age of enlightened participation in democracy. www.MumbaiVotes.com is The Informed Mumbai Voter Project. It does not seek to influence the voter by saying who is good or bad. That is a subjective judgement. Instead MumbaiVotes relentlessly pursues objectivity. It merely seeks to present before you what your elected representative has done since s/he began the journey from Candidate to 'Elected Representative'.”

This, the portal does by an elaborate methodology. It tracks information from various sources like election manifestos, newspaper articles, video interviews and data sourced from reliable sites like PRSIndia.org, ADRIndia.org, eci.gov.in, loksabha.nic.in among others. This data is processed by applying an analysis method to convert numbers into visual indicators: Red, Orange, and Green Flags for each of the analysis categories separately. Explaining this, Vivek says, “An MP or MLA can lie about their achievements. What they cannot lie about, is what they have actually done e.g. how have they spent tax-payers money, what has been their performance in Parliament, State Assembly or Municipality, and what do different newspaper reports say about their achievements or failures. The complex methodology (available on http://mumbaivotes.com/files/downloads/MV_Methodology_Det...) took five years to perfect and is reliable. A politician can run, but he cannot hide from MumbaiVotes.com. Every single movement is monitored and the results are crisply communicated to the public. With MumbaiVotes, MLA’s, MPs and Corporators have no option but to deliver.”

MumbaiVotes’ Communication Panel Head, Mo Polamar, adds, “A democracy is a government that is for, of and by the people. This means, every piece of information should be public property. But it is not. The RTI act challenged this status quo and won. MumbaiVotes takes the spirit of RTI and contextualizes available data on our politicians and their promises. No longer can they shirk accountability because the account of their deeds and misdeeds is noted on MumbaiVotes.com for the world to see and to haunt them forever.”  But lest you think the portal is a product of cynicism that seeks to highlight only deficiencies and ineptitude, Vivek clarifies “Till date a local politician had no real incentive to motivate him or her towards progressive politics. An article about the meritorious work would appear in newspapers and then swiftly disappear from public memory. Meanwhile, divisive, interest-group, and caste based politics paid perpetual dividends. Now, with the dawning of MumbaiVotes, that single record of good performance will never be allowed to fade from public memory. It is undeniable that this simple truth can alter the political landscape as progressive politics can become a truly politically savvy policy to pursue.”

The making of MumbaiVotes.com itself is no less a movement. Its vigilant eyes have been watching over Mumbai for the past five years. During the last year, a team of over hundred individuals from all strata of life: PhDs, journalism students, Social Science Researchers, CEO’s, salaried individuals….came together to pool in their talent to gather the necessary information required to set up the project. The Research & Analysis Methodology has been approved by Dr. Alok Thakore (Member - The Media Foundation (India), Teacher, Columnist, Media Consultant) and Dr. Uttara Sahasrabuddhe (Reader in International Politics in the Department of Civics and Politics, Associate Professor at University of Mumbai) and adheres to the principles of Social Science Research. Currently the portal tracks 915 politicians whose actions directly or indirectly, affect the lives of Mumbai residents. The list includes already elected candidates plus the contenders for this year general elections.

www.MumbaiVotes.com thus answers simple to the most complicated queries related to elections such as;

•   What has your Elected Representative done for their constituency since they got elected?
•   How does one measure performance versus promise?

www.MumbaiVotes.com is a must visit portal for political studies students, researchers, analysts, journalists, social activist and any awakened individual who wants to know and then to make a difference. So, let the guessing cease. Let the truth unleash. From now on, Mumbai – Don’t just Vote. Select.

Log on to www.MumbaiVotes.com

For more information, contact: info@mumbaivotes.com or call Satyen K. Bordoloi: +91 9967970320 or Vikas Sharma: +919833600617