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ENGAGING WITH PARTICIPATORY LOCAL GOVERNANCE IN INDIA Presented by Satinder Sahni, PRIA

“..each village a complete republic …… independent for its vital wants and yet interdependent for many others in which dependence is necessity.”-Gandhi’s vision of Village Governance

“The smallest territorial unit should be able to exercise effective control over its corporate life by means of a popularly elected panchayat.”- “Objectives” Resolution of the Indian National Congress in 1947:

The above briefly captures the need/importance for decentralization that finally got reflected in the Directive Principles of State Policy (Article 40 of the Constitution) wherein “The state shall take steps to organize village Panchayats and endow them with such powers and authority as may be necessary to enable them to function as units of self-government.”

The Directive Principle was largely ignored for four decades (1950-1990) – a period where ‘Centralization’ was the dominant principle of governance. The period was marked, for many years, with the dominance of a single political party (the Congress) both at the federal level and in the states. The process of centralized governance was underpinned by an ideology of planned development (centralized allocation of resources by the Planning Commission; a state led programme for investments in industry and infrastructure; the belief that the state should control and direct the commanding heights of the economy) and a bureaucratic system of controls and regulation, inherited from a colonial government There were sporadic initiatives during this period to introduce democratic decentralization – especially following the review of the Community Development Programme in the late 1950s’ by the Balwant Rai Mehta Committee. The committee’s recommendations were based on its evaluation that in the absence of democratic decentralization no meaningful and sustained development could be expected. However, elected Panchayats and municipal governments were assigned limited functions and even more limited resources and their tenures were subject to the whims of the government of the day. Regular elections to Panchayats and municipalities became casualties to the process of political uncertainty and fragmentation, which was witnessed from the late 1960’s.

The first considered response to the Constitutional Directive on decentralization, at the central level, came during the late 1980’s in the form of the 64th Constitutional Amendment Bill. This Bill was finally adopted in 1992 as the 73rd Amendment to the Constitution (along with the 74th Amendment relating to Urban local governance). It is pertinent to note that the passage of the Bill coincided with the macro economic crisis

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and a slew of policy measures to liberalize the economy (to deregulate, deflate and devalue). These policy responses were matched by wide spread recognition that the model of state led, state dominated development had failed to accomplish the task that Jawahar Lal Nehru had identified in his address on the eve of Independence in 1947: “the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity.”

Economic growth in terms of GDP, in India, was characterized by the “Hindu rate of growth” despite high levels of domestic savings and investments. While deprivations have been reduced considerably in intensity since Independence e.g. substantial decline in age specific mortality rates and a higher expectation of life at birth, the overall record is particularly dismal when compared to developing countries in broadly similar position. Other aspects of living conditions like elementary education, nutritional characteristics, protection from illness and social security also reflect the relatively poor performance of India: nowhere near the radical reduction in human deprivation and improvements in the quality of life of citizens achieved by developing countries like South Korea, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, China. It is also relevant, at this point, to recognize the regional diversity, within India, in the reduction of basic deprivations. For example Kerala’s record in terms of life expectancy, IMR, literacy (including female literacy) is comparable to that of the developing countries mentioned above. It is in glaring contrast to the record of other states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan in India.

Analysts have tended to ascribe the Indian failure to address poverty, to the dominant reliance on State and the insufficient development of market incentives. The impulse for decentralization (from the late 1980’s in the case of the Central Government) is also traced to the recognition of the failure of centralized mode of decision-making and the top down processes of development. It is a fact that the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution followed immediately upon the macro-economic crises of 1990-91 and the stabilization and structural adjustments, packages administered by the IMF and the World Bank. However, as Amartaya Sen has noted, the failures, in the development of educational facilities, health care provisions, and environmental protection cannot be ascribed to “overactive” government alone. The errors of commission (state led allocation of resources, public investment in manufacturing and services) are to be viewed together with the errors of omission (under investments in health, nutrition and education). The basic issue therefore, is not that of ‘over governance’ or ‘under governance’ but that of the quality of governance.

The constitutional mandate for democratic governance at the local (village, municipal) level as embodied in the 73rd and 74th Amendments acknowledges that:

Centralized governance stifled local initiative and participation;

Top down planning led to a dependency amongst the citizens, and, that growth continued to exclude large groups in society (women, dalits, tribal);

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Good governance (accountable, transparent, corruption free) is only possible when citizens have opportunities to participate in and practice democratic decision making in so far as such decisions affect the quality of their lives.

The structure for democratic decentralisation as provided in the 73rd and 74th Amendments is characterised by:

a fixed tenure of 5 years for elected representatives;

a neutral body to assure free and fair elections in the shape of State Election Commission;

a State Finance Commission, constituted every 5 years to recommend the principles governing the division of taxes, resources, fees etc. between the state and local governments;

reservation of seats and offices in elected bodies for women (not less than one third) and for dalits and tribal;

the entrustment of responsibilities for preparation of plans for economic development and social justice as well for their implementation, upon elected local governments

the accountability of elected representatives in Panchayats to the Gram Sabhas

This framework thus recognises the critical link between good governance, participation (including affirmative action in respect of those excluded by institutions and processes of governance and development) and equality of opportunities (for education, good health, livelihood and for making informed choices).

Governmental Approach to Local Self-Government Institutions

Tenth Plan Approach: democratic decentralisation not an end in itself but a process for harnessing energies of people for bringing about social transformation.

Government of India pronouncements high in terms of intentions (year 2000-2001 – year of the Gram Sabha as per the Budget Speech) but with little follow up in actual fund flows—special concern with regard to failure to integrate transfers under schemes/programmes, through local elected governments. Both Central and State Government grants to local governments are specific and ‘tied’ to particular purposes.

Despite recommendations of State Finance Commissions the system of grant to local governments in most of the states is not rationalized and suffers from inadequacy and uncertainty

A Review of Centrally Sponsored Schemes of the Departments of Health and Family Welfare, Department of Education, Ministry of Environment and Forests, has shown a tendency to constitute a parallel (to local governments) delivery system

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Report of the Working Group on Decentralised Planning and Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRI’s), for the Tenth Plan, has spelt out the need for Central Ministries to simplify programme guidelines and indicate modus operandi for involvement of PRI’s in executing programmes which relate to the subject matters falling within the functional domain of PRI’s. It also observed that the Externally Aided Projects tended to set up separate formations for implementation and recommended that in the care of EAP’s the role of PRI’s should be spelt out.

A government report noted that approximately Rs. 700,000 million of central and state funds are expended on schemes which fall under the functional domain of PRI’s but a very small percentage of this expenditure is actually ‘overseen’ by elected representatives.

Government capacity to press for further decentralisation critical to further progress of the process but severely hampered by

a) the fiscal strain on the budgets of both the Central and State Governments; b) the inability to grapple with the need for ‘downsizing’ government

(accentuated by the compulsions of coalitional politics) c) the inability to move the mechanism for transfers from the area of political

discretion (Planning Commission et al) to one of apolitical, principle led process (e.g. The Finance Commission).

d) the tendency to appease national/state level political interest (MP/MLA-Local Area Development Funds) by continuing to squeeze space for decision making in local governments.

e) the continued reliance on technocratic, expert led, top down approach to resource allocation and the devaluation of local knowledge and initiatives.

Governmental efforts in building capacities of local bodies (and their elected representatives) tend to be formal, sequential and tardy. Such efforts fail to take into account the needs for capacity building of new groups entering public life for the first time.

Civil Society and Local Government Institutions

Gaps in Local Government Functioning

a) No regular initiative in voters’ education and information dissemination prior to Local Body elections by the States/ Centre/ Political Parties

b) Lack of systematic efforts in promoting Participation in Governance via Gram/ Ward Sabhas (Village Assemblies)

c) Sporadic Capacity building efforts by Governmental Agencies of Local Body leaders

d) Access to authentic information on time.

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e) Inadequate support mechanism by Government agencies to encourage leadership among women and other marginalized groups

Intervention Strategies to Address these Gaps

1. Public Education: Building Platforms of Civil society actors for creating an informed critical mass via campaign approach – Pre-Election Voters’ Awareness Campaign (PEVAC) and Gram Sabha Mobilisation Campaign – for enhancing participation especially that of women and weaker sections in the democratic decentralisation processes.

2. Information dissemination: Providing simplified and authentic information with easy reach of the rural masses via promoting ‘social audit’ (as in the case of Right to Information furthered by MKSS), Panchayat Resource Centres (PRCs) at the intermediate level (PRIA).

3. Support to newly elected leaders:

Utilising the platforms of Civil society actors in providing immediate orientation –Panchayat Pratinidhi Jagrukta Abhiyan (PRJA)- followed by intensive training to Local Body leaders. For example, in Uttar Pradesh 14000 members of Gram Panchayats were covered in a month in the initial oriented by a network of just 20 voluntary organisations within the state. While the state government figure for 1995-2000 say that a total number of 14,000 elected members were trained by the government during a span of 5 years.

Preparation of simple and replicable participatory training modules and learning materials. Such modules/ Training material prepared by PRIA and partners are presently being shared with Government training agencies in several states.

4. Advocacy effort: the pro-active efforts of civil society have ensured public interest litigation and intervention by the higher judiciary in order to overcome postponement of elections to local governments by the government of the day in various states.

Research based advocacy around issues hindering/ promoting democratic governance are brought at the state and nationals levels to generate debate/ dialogue with policy makers, government functionaries, media, academicians and donors to pave the way for conducive policy formulation and implementation.

5. Facilitating Networks: Cohesive civil society action, which knits together networks and coalitions among local body leaders, community groups (like SHGs, Youth Groups, Mahila Mandals) for building pressure for conducive, accountable and transparent governance.

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Major donor interventions and Decentralised Governance

Clear articulation of agenda for ‘good governance’ and its link to poverty reduction. Decentralisation, accountability, transparency seen as essential ingredients of ‘good governance’. This has helped

a) push policy frameworks (both central and state governments) into more pro-decentralisation mode;

b) ‘Crowd in’ investments across the donor community in support of decentralisation agenda.

c) enlarged space for civil society to engage at local and national level and to create an enabling, supportive environment for local governments.

However, donor interventions have failed to institutionalise the links between sector specific programmes and local governments, on account of:

a) a perspective which continues to view local governments as tail end of an administrative hierarchy rather than units of self governance;

b) readiness to create project led structures (users groups, committees, project units) parallel to or in competition with local governments.

c) reliance on project cycles and relative reluctance to underwrite investments in medium-long term processes experimentation which create necessary pre conditions for good governance.

Challenges for the future

1. Building pressure from below

Regular meetings of Gram/Ward Sabhas

Participation (in gram/ward sabha meetings) by citizens from the marginalized sections of society (women, dalits, tribals)

Coalition building/alliances/networking amongst elected members of Panchayats across the block/district/state elected representatives from marginalized sections organizations of the marginalized groups (CBO’s/SHG’s/Dalit

groups) and elected representatives in panchayats from such groups.

Local governments exert control over use of public resources as per local needs and priorities.

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2. Intermediation by civil society – development/rights NGO’s, CBO’s, media, academic

Facilitating areas of information and awareness building (e.g. Information Resource Centres)

Promoting public action (on persistent deprivations) so that a culture of indifference is replaced by one of constructive engagement (trans-generational, trans regional approach)

Building wide platform for NGOs/CBOs/Media and academicians to network and advocate for good governance.

Knowledge creation and knowledge sharing so as to strengthen capacity of local response to imperatives of globalisation.

3. Ensuring institutional response

Government of India (Planning Commission, Ministries) incentivising decentralisation efforts by State Governments (fulfilling Constitutional mandate of 73rd and 74th Amendments). Parastatals need to be discouraged.

State Governments nurture Local Governments by Transferring funds, functionaries and functions to elected local

governments Holding elections wherever due Discouraging the formation of parallel bodies to Local Governments Partnering civil society organizations for capacity building of local

government officials (elected and non-elected) and recognising the need for complementarities of approaches.

enlarging the space for bottom up planning and decision making so that local needs and local priorities (as reflected in Gram Sabhas) guide resource allocation and resource use.

Framing policies, procedures in consonance with the principle of subsidiarity and reforming other legislation in tune with the 73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendment.

Gains over the last decade

What is noted above are real concerns about the space available to panchayats: they should not be treated as a counsel for despair. For, despite the many constraints, there have been substantial gains made and the agenda of local democracy advanced to a significant extent.

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Most states in the union have gone through a second round of elections to panchayats. And, wherever the elections have been conducted, they have witnessed very high voter turnout. In almost all the cases the percentage of votes polled have been much higher than those polled in the elections to state legislatures and Lok Sabha. There is clear evidence of the widespread engagement of citizens with the process of local decision making at the local level: the need is to encourage this engagement and to help take it to the next logical stage of participation in Gram Sabhas. There is a lesson also for state governments which have been dragging their feet over elections to panchayats (e.g. Jharkhand): they do so at the cost of their own legitimacy in the public mind.

The state governments have adopted legislation in conformity with the 73rd

Amendment to the Constitution. This has enabled the establishment of panchayats at village, block and district level. Thus there is a statutory framework which enables democratic participation in decision making in and accountability of local governance. This implies a qualitative change: elected local governments are perceived as creatures of the constitution which cannot be dissolved or superseded on the basis of arbitrary, whimsical executive fiat.

The provisions of the Panchayati Raj framework, as elucidated in the 73rd

Amendment have been extended to the Tribal areas, enumerated in Schedule V of the Constitution. The Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas Act (PESA) goes a long way in advancing the rights of tribal communities in respect of access to, and, control over natural resources. It offers potential for the reassertion of tribal identity based on local decision making through a bargaining framework which is advantageous to tribals. The rights of Gram Sabhas envisaged in PESA offer a model for Gram Sabhas for all other areas in terms of enabling village communities to assert control over local natural resources. Such a process could help reverse the widespread alienation of local stakes in forest, land and water management and thereby promote environmentally sustainable development.

The mandate for local development cast upon panchayats has been taken

seriously by some states and this has encouraged local level planning by panchayats. The outcome has helped a closer alignment of resources to locally felt needs and priorities. Kerala’s experimentation with ‘Peoples Plan’, whereby a fixed percentage of the plan budget is transferred to panchayats, for allocation as per local decision making, is clearly a model to be emulated. It has helped optimise resource use and also reduced the dependency on planned investments which were determined and implemented in a top down fashion. The process has also facilitated stake formation in Gram Sabhas and thereby provided a much wider base for citizen engagement with decision making.

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The reservations for women, dalits and tribals in panchayats at all levels, have served to promote and nurture leadership of these sections. Slowly but surely, tales of ‘Sarpanchpatis’(Husbands of elected women acting on behalf of their wives) and proxy women/dalit candidates are giving way to accounts of effective leadership on local issues, being asserted by subaltern groups, who had been at the margins of decision making structures of polity and society. And, there are instances of empowerment which signify profound shifts in society - a survey of women who had held elected office in panchayats revealed, that, a majority perceived clear gains as a result in terms of better status within their households. Almost two thirds of the women surveyed, expressed a readiness to stand for elections again even if the seats were not reserved. The experience of holding elected offices in panchayats has also enabled dalits to voice their needs, draw attention to the discrimination they face in public institutions and to confront such discrimination. This assertion of ‘dalit’ voice has special significance for states where political parties have yet to mobilize and politicize dalits.

The Promise of Participatory Democracy

Experience of working with Panchayats across various states suggests that wherever panchayts have functioned as institutions of governance they have helped effect a transformation in rural society, economy and polity. It is important that as institutions of governance, panchayats are not led into making the same mistakes as were committed by state and central governments: mistakes like taking on roles which could be best played by civil society and the market, of pre-empting the space for local initiative and enterprise. The true promise of panchayats lies in sticking to the core business of governance and the role cast upon them for “local development and social justice”. Case studies based upon work with panchayats offer clear evidence of the potential they hold for: Enabling optimization of public resource use through

o Better alignment with local felt needs; o Reduction in duplication of resource allocation; o Timely completion of projects, often at costs considerably lower than

estimated by government agencies ; o Better utilization of school and health services

Providing a ‘voice’ in decision making for women, Dalits and Tribals and thereby creating opportunities for a pattern of public resource allocation (and public goods delivery) which addresses their needs;

Ensuring accountability in respect of expenditure of public resources

for public good;

Facilitating sustainable linkages between local income, savings and investments cycles,

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Framing and enforcing norms in respect of use of local natural resources; and

Creating an enabling environment for local development through

conflict resolution and provision of public goods like security, law and order.

Lessons From Programme Implementation

PRIA and partner institutions are working towards strengthening Panchayati Raj Institutions as institutions of local self-governance. The programmatic interventions began in the year 1995, just after enactment of conformity acts (consequent to 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992) in states in the year 1994.PRIA's Strategic Review1 mandates a long-term commitment towards strengthening the institutions of Local Self Governance. Internal and external programmatic reviews carried out by PRIA and its partners have emphasised scaling up and deepening of the programme. An overview of the programmatic progress over the years is outlined below.

What was more relevant in Programme Practice

1 The strategy which linked micro-level experiments in strengthening participation through local governance, with the process of learning for enabling a) public action on a large scale; and b) a positive policy response. The pan-Indian character of democratic decentralization required an approach, which was sufficiently rooted in the local context but encouraged sharing of lessons across states and institutional frameworks at the macro level. The network of PRIA and Regional Support Organizations provided the platform for such an approach and also enabled exchange of learning across the South Asian Region.

2 The focus of programmatic interventions on enabling participation by the

marginalized groups in rural communities was especially relevant given the inequities of caste, gender, class and religious identities in rural communities across India. The programme had perceived the window of opportunity offered by reservations for women, dalits and tribals in panchayats for strengthening the ‘voice’ of such groups in decision making and this helped shape interventions across all the strategic areas of the programme viz. information dissemination, capacity building and the use of knowledge for policy advocacy. Given the history of ‘exclusion’ in rural Indian communities, specific interventions were developed to build, strengthen and sustain the leadership of the marginalized groups.

3 The programme’s vision of PRI’s as institutions of self-governance placed them

squarely at the center of the entire process of development. The programmatic practice which followed helped link issues like access to natural resources, human capital development, public infrastructure local, economic activities and social opportunities, to the process of participatory decision making in Panchayats. The other relevant spin offs which evolved as a result of programme practice were:

1 PRIA, 1999: Enter the New Millennium - Strategic Plan of PRIA, April 1999

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a the potential for local accountability of public resource deployment through

Gram Sabhas; b the possibility of strengthening transparency in decision making through

sharing of information with Gram Sabhas; and c the scope for bottom up participatory planning which could help align public

resource allocation with locally felt needs and priorities, mediated by democratic decision making.

4 The process of embedding democratic decentralization in Indian society is huge in

scale and the questions linked to local capacity, institutional indifference, asymmetrical access to services and exclusion cannot possibly be addressed any one institutional frame acting alone the state, the market or Civil Society. Keeping this in view, programme practice sought to promote a wide spread civil society engagement with the process of democratic decentralization and the active pursuit of collaborations and partnerships across different institutional frameworks. The civil society engagement with the issues in strengthening PRI’s took varied paths:

community based organization like Mahila Mandals, providing hand

holding to women elected representatives; small voluntary organizations providing as resource persons in workshops

to build the capacity of newly elected representatives and to disseminate information during elections to panchayats;

intermediary organizations to help build information networks and to

sensitize state level officials to nurture panchayats;

networks of large civil society organizations to undertake policy dialogues and seek judicial remedies against attempts to thwart the constitutional mandate for regular, timely election to PRI’s.

Media personnel and organisations providing in depth reports on grassroots

issues involved in democratic decentralization.

Members of the academia researching and teaching on issues of Panchayat functioning.

What was more effective in Programme Implementation

1. The intensive work in selected sites, through Panchayat Resource

Centres, helped provide depth to the programme. It helped consolidate the delivery of inputs – including information support, capacity building, local micro planning, and promotion of networks – across all the panchayats in the selected blocks and

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thereby provided visibility to programmatic interventions. The PRC’s played a catalytic role as change agent by enabling PRI’s to link with governmental programmes and schemes, by facilitating access to other institutional frames and development actors. As a result, PRC’s have provided a rich reservoir of cases, models and innovations on issues like how PRI’s promote better utilization of resources, what hinders/promotes, women’s participation in Gram Sabhas and in Gram Panchayats, etc. PRC’s have also been effective in promoting working, functional relationship between Gram Panchayats and Panchayat Samitis at the intermediary level.

2. The intensive delivery of inputs through PRC’s was linked to an extension strategy, which helped enlarge the outreach and influence of the programme. The State Resource Centres played a pivotal role in the transmission of what was learnt at PRC sites to other civil society organizations in the states as well as to higher level state bureaucracy and institutions. SRC’s functioned effectively in providing a platform for exchange of information, in helping consolidate and synthesize learning from the field sites and for enabling the application of the learning and knowledge to influence policy outcomes. The value added by SRC’s in the process of strengthening the capacity of State Institutions of Rural Development has been quite significant and has been recognized by several state governments.

3. One of the most effective components of programme strategy has

been the evolution of a campaign approach in the areas of

a) voter awareness during elections to PRI’s;

b) the timely delivery of orientation to newly elected representatives in Panchayats; and

c) mobilizing in Gram Sabhas.

The campaigns taken up sequentially in the states where elections to PRI’s took place, provided a platform of civil society organizations to collaborate and to focus on specific issues related to the functioning of PRI’s. In the process, the outreach of the programme was enhanced quite considerably and helped served a larger public education purpose. The collaborative partnerships developed during the campaigns provided significant support to address other issues vital to democratic decentralization including partnerships with State Election Commission and national/local level media. PRJA campaigns (to provide prompt orientation to newly elected representatives) enabled the recognition of the need for complementarities of approaches to capacity building, between bottom up, demand driven processes and the macro-level state institutional response.

4. The conscious linkage between information sharing, knowledge

creation and advocacy, employed in programme implementation was critical to address public perceptions and institutional indifference to PRI’s. The strategy of

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using participatory research at the grass roots level and taking the lessons from research to implementation levels (District Administration) and Policy Formulation levels (State/Central Government, donor community) helped bring focus to issues like constitutional reforms, parallel structures which undermine accountable local governance, improving access to and delivery of primary education at the village level, -- in the process public discussion, debate and discourse were enriched. And a process launched whereby public institutions were prodded into responding.

(PRIA is an International Center for Learning and Promotion of Participatory and Democratic Governance. Since 1995, it has been undertaking a programme for strengthening institutions of Local Self Governments in India)