Balanced scorecard approach for Indian MPs

According to a RTI, file on June 3

rd
, 2009, Lok Sabha secretariat said that there is no provision
either in constitution of India or in Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha that
defines the duties and responsibilities of a Member of Parliament (MP) and through which non
performing MPs could be held accountable.
Similar replies were given by assemblies of Bihar, Haryana, Assam, Kerala and many others.
Its only Sikkim, where the assembly has specified provision defining the duties and responsibilities
of MLA as follows:
"It will be their prime duty to maintain communal harmony and peace among the people of
their respective constituencies."
As a step towards forming a balanced scorecard that will measure the performance of an
MP, during his tenure we have to follow certain steps. These steps are mentioned as below:
Mapping of Stakeholders & Responsibilities towards them
Measures to evaluate performance (Balanced Scorecard Approach)
Suggestions for Implementation
Stakeholders & Responsibilities towards them:
1. People of the constituency of MP: Depending upon the various reasons such as geographic
conditions, demographic conditions, religion, language etc different constituencies may have
different needs to be fulfilled. However certain basic needs such a food, security, shelter
remains the same for all the constituencies. An MP selected from anywhere from India,
should have a focus on making the basic needs available for his people who elected him as
their representative to represent their state/union territory.

2. India as a Nation: The MPs selected in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha are responsible for
designing the legislations which would be applicable throughout the country. For ex: The
Citizen Ombudsmen Act will be effective and powerful only after the proper drafting and
support from the MPs at both the houses. Thus the performance of an MP should be judged
based on his participation and thought process showcased by him in order to bring/stop
certain bill or legislation for the benefit of the country.

3. Other MPs and Government officials: The MPs acts as an operating head for different
bureaucratic offices of his constituency. The official from different public offices reports him
about the proceedings. Thus it is necessary to quantify the increase/decrease in the
efficiency of the public sector services during the tenure of an MP in his constituency.

4. Foreign nations: The party with majority of MPs elected form the government at the center
which makes decision at national level. The cabinet of ministers headed by the PM consists
of MPs who won from different constituencies. Thus the decision taken by them have an
impact on relationship of India in terms of business, security, peace etc with other nations of
the world. Thus an MP must be evaluated on this front as well.


Measures to Evaluate Performance
The diagram shown below depicts the Balanced Scorecard card approach and shows the four major
aspects that need to be considered while rating the performance of an employee which here in our
case is the member of the parliament. We will elaborate further as to how to measure the score of
an MP on this four fronts i.e. Finance, Internal Business Processes, Learning and growth, and the
Customers.




People
-Electricity and water supply provided?
-Cost effective transportation provided?
-Facilities at Government hospitals
-Level of education in the constituency
-Employment opportunity generation

Economy
-Utilisation of funds provided by central
government
-Encouragement for industrialisation and
agriculture?
-How much revenue generated by public
sector and private sector ?
-Status of agricultural output of the
constituency?(depend on constituency)

Modus Operandi
-Level of corruption in government
organisation?
-Response time for solving queries of people
at govenment offices in the constituency
-Status of law and order? Crime rate in the
constituency?

Popularity
-Number of people joining the party?
Following the ideology
-Past decisions their benifits and
consequences?
-Work done to create awareness among
citizens about epidemic diseases, new
technologoies, etc
1. People (Customer):
Objective: The customers in this case are the people who voted for an MP, to make him their
representative. The objective is the satisfaction and fulfilment of the basic needs of people.
Improve the standard of living of the general household at economic level.
Measures: Work at the grass root level, in unison with the local MLAs to focus on the
commitment towards people. Hold the government officials accountable for delay in the
works of people. There should be a timely feedback of people, addressing their grievances.
Also take into account their suggestions for solving the problem.
Target: To ensure 24 hours electricity and water supply to the people of his constituency.
Access to basic medical facilities for every individual in the constituency by setting up
government hospitals. Ensure security of the people from any kind of internal and external
threat. Maintain communal harmony and peace in the constituency. Maintain proper
infrastructure and transportation facilities for the convenience of public at affordable price.
Initiatives: In order to save power and water proper billing system should be in place. This
will help in reducing theft of such resources. MPs should initiate new infrastructure
development projects for the betterment of people. There should be timely repairs of roads,
drainages, government hospitals etc.



2. Economic condition of the constituency (Financial):
Objective: The main objective under finance is to use the financial amount provided by the
central government in a best possible manner for the welfare of the people in the
constituency.
Measures: The MP during his tenure should help in increase employment in his constituency
by means of industrialisation or agriculture creating opportunities for local people. This will
in turn add to the revenue generated by the state/UT. The public sector firms should work
efficiently and timelines should be maintained so as to become profit making entities
instead of loss making liabilities for state. The MP should keep a check on revenues
generated by public sector firms.
Targets: To set target an MP should focus on a plan of generating minimum one job per
house to make sure the well being of a particular family. Besides this, an MP can target the
distinctive capabilities of his state/ region, for ex, crops grown in that region, or any specific
skilled labour of that region etc, and focus on increasing employment opportunities for
people using Industrialisation or subsidies to encourage them.
Initiatives: People could be given employment under different infrastructure projects of
government, facilitate farmer-industry interaction forums, so that they both can channelize,
the resources to generate maximum revenue for state. Encourage private
investors/entrepreneurs by giving them tax rebates, concessions for their initial years. For
public sector firms, performance based appraisal should be started.

3. Modus Operandi (Internal Business Processes):
Objective: The objective here is to channelize and optimise the internal processes followed
by the government.
Measures: The MP should make sure that the various government officials under the
bureaucratic system works in a corruption free environment. Strict actions should be taken
against those who indulge in bribery related activities.
Targets: To achieve corruption free business process to propagate maximum benefits of
government run schemes for the local people. In case of rural areas, ensure reach of
government subsidies and healthcare facilities.
Initiatives: The MP can appoint a Vigilance Team. This team will report directly to him about
the various malpractices followed by government officials that are acting as delaying factor
for inefficient business processes. Strict action likes suspension and judicial measures should
be taken against such corrupt employees. The MPs can also organise weekly Sabha, or online
complaint registrations to ensure that the glitches the system are overcome quickly. An MP
should head an auditing team which will ensure both transparencies in funding of both
private and government offices/industries.

4. Increasing popularity (Learning and Growth):
Objective: The MPs should learn from the mistakes made in the past by MP of his state and
also from other constituencies and come up with better plausible solutions.
Measures: The MP should encourage communication between various departments under
him, so as to facilitate them with better understanding of problems faced by people of the
constituency.
Targets: The main learning objective is growth. Growth here applies in context of living
standards of people.
Initiatives: Use of ERP systems to standardise process followed across government offices
with the constituency of an MP.MPs could use Knowledge Management systems (KMS) to
facilitate peer to peer learning and also proper communication between government
officials. They should start new computer education centers across their constituency to
facilitate learning of modern technologies to people. MPs should start new government
colleges for all technical/non technical fields to facilitate learning to poor and needy
individuals transforming them into skilled labour. This in turn will benefit in increasing
industrial production of the state/region.

Suggestion for Implementation:
In order to have a balanced scorecard measuring the performance of an MP based on the above
mentioned factors, it is necessary that the government in power passes a bill in the house that will
make this Scorecard an official performance measurer for all MPs. If the bill gets passed with 2/3
rd

majority in the parliament we would be able to have an accountability to the MPs work which
currently is not there in the present stem.

References:
http://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/performance-management/reference-
materials/historical/using-a-balanced-scorecard-approach-to-measure-performance/
http://balancedscorecard.org/Resources/AbouttheBalancedScorecard/tabid/55/Default.aspx
http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/maprod/documents/BalancedScorecardPerfAndMeth.pdf
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-04-15/india/29421016_1_mlas-duties-
accountability