Praja Foundation in collaboration with Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) launched its municipal fellowship programme Cohort-1 of 2022-23 in Srinagar. It is Srinagar’s first-ever Municipal Fellowship Program that will give young citizens of Srinagar a platform to engage in the process of urban governance while working alongside Srinagar’s Municipal Councillors and Administration.
The registration will start from Wednesday, 31st May till 19th June 2022 and application forms are available on Praja’s website.
In this program, Srinagar would be divided into 4 zones and four fellows would be placed in each zone. The fellows will help the elected representatives discharge their most basic function – raising questions on the floor of the House/committees; and provide support in official tasks to the administration. These fellows will get a platform to work on citizens’ needs at ward and zonal level, projects and proposals on developmental works by SMC, as well as on other prevalent issues and help in communication between elected representatives and the administration. The work will comprise of providing data briefs and helping in research work.
“No modern society can embark on the path of structural progression without a robust and sincere coalition between those who represent the people’s will and it’s youth. That can only happen by virtue of a soulful involvement of opinionated and motivated youth by bearing the torch of ‘citizen partnership’ in the process of clean governance.”said Junaid Azim Mattu, Mayor, Srinagar Municipal Corporation
“Partnership of Praja Foundation and Srinagar Municipal Corporation will give an opportunity to the fellows to be active participants and contributors in the Srinagar City’s Municipal Administration. The fellowship will give the students to learn and explore about the urban issues and challenges and will also give an opportunity to work on their solutions. The fellows will be working closely with the elected public representatives and with the officials, engineers and administration of SMC”, said Athar Aamir Khan, Municipal Commissioner, Srinagar Municipal Corporation.
“Among Praja Foundation’s several efforts towards better governance in the city of Delhi and Mumbai, the Elected Representative Fellowship Programme has always been one of the highlights. We have successfully run three cohorts of the Fellowship Programme in Mumbai (2017-18, 2018-19, 2019-20) and the fourth cohort has started in March 2022; and 1 cohort in Delhi (2019-20). The number of fellows ranged from 10 to 20 who had put around 5000 hours to over 15000 hours of work in each cohort. During cohort 3 of the fellowship, they conducted 1,146 meetings in Mumbai with councillors to provide data and research support. Impacts such as increase in dispensary timings and raising of citizen relevant questions have been observed through the fellowships”, said Nitai Mehta, Founder and Managing Trustee, Praja Foundation.
“The Programme aims to provide Srinagar’s leaders a fully dedicated team of individuals as their research assistants; and exposure to the youth by making them understand ground realities to do with governance. Srinagar Municipal Fellowship Cohort-1 is a 10 months paid Fellowship Programme that will comprise of 16 fellows who will work with the Municipal Councillors and Administration.
The fellows will provide support through research work to the leaders of Srinagar”, said Milind Mhaske, Chief Executive Officer, Praja Foundation.
For Application Graduates & Postgraduates who are residents of Srinagar can apply for this programme.
Fellows of Cohort-1 will have to complete the 10-month fellowship programme. Registration will start from today (31st May 2022) till 19th June 2022 and application forms are available on Srinagar Municipal Corporation website (www.smcsrinagar.in) Praja’s website (www.praja.org).
