Karbi Anglong, one of the two hill districts of Assam, which has been in the news for ethnic clashes, militancy, abductions and attack on Hindi-speaking “outsiders”, has something good to talk about: the district’s administrative headquarters has been awarded an ISO 9001:2000 certificate.In fact, Karbi Anglong is the fourth district in the country, and the first in the Northeastern region, to have won this certificate with Det Norske Veritas (DNV), a Netherlands-based organisation selecting it for handling public grievances, establishment and public facilitation services in the district.While the certificate was formally handed over to Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi by Rupam Baruah, operations head of DNV in the Northeast, Karbi Anglong deputy commissioner M Angamuthu said even as the process for introducing quality management system was in progress, the district authorities had started clearing on an average 300 requests and grievances of the public on a daily basis.“For a district that is backward and has a large tribal population, access to basic services itself was a big problem. But after streamlining the deputy commissioner’s office and making all the employees computer-literate, we have been able to clear most requests for issue of caste or tribe certificates and other documents to the public within the same day,” Angamuthu said.
