Making Panchayats Work as Local Democracy

India celebrated 20 years of National Panchayati Raj Day on April 24, 2013. A ceremony of sorts was held in Vigyan Bhawan where Honâble Prime Minister distributed some awards and made some innocuous remarks like “bureaucracy is holding panchayats down”. He has been making similar remarks on this Day for the past several years. Ironically, he is the CEO of all bureaucracy in the country. A conclusion can be drawn that he is not interested in changing this status quo.

On this occasion, the Report of the Expert Committee on strengthening Panchayats, headed by Mani Shankar Aiyer was also released. This Report laments the lack of effective devolution to panchayats, and suggests some practical ways to improve their contributions in delivery of basic services. What the report contains by way of analysis and solutions are already known to the Prime Minister and the cabinet of India. Then it is unlikely that any of its recommendations would be followed up by this government.

After the UPA government came to power in 2004, a national Ministry of Panchayati Raj was set up with Mani Shankar Aiyer as the Minister. This practice was changed in 2009 when UPA II came to power. The Ministry of Panchayati Raj lost its independent status; it was first merged with Ministry of Rural Development, and now with Ministry of Tribal Affairs. As a consequence, the panchayats became administrative agencies under DRDA and other rural development programmes; they lost their character as institutions of local self-governance.

The Prime Minister creates ministries and Ministers; so, he obviously did not want to allow an independent Ministry of Panchayati Raj.

As administrative agencies of rural development, panchayat leaders became sub-contractors, and learnt to behave like that. They started making money as contractors of panchayats, both fair and foul. As contractors, they became accountable to petty officials of those departments and schemes. As political leaders, they ignored their democratic accountability to citizens.

It is no surprise, therefore, that the latest Comptroller and Auditor-Generals (CAG) Report on implementation of rural employment guarantee scheme (MNREGA) reveals that nearly a third of the funds have been siphoned off through corruption.

It is ironical, indeed, that the progress on implementation of Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Area Act (PESA) and Forest Rights Act (FRA) meant to empower Gram Sabha in tribal villages have not been seriously implemented, despite the fact that currently Minister for Tribal Affairs  is also responsible for panchayats. The Supreme Courtâs judgment in Vedanta mining company case in Odisha last week is a clear indictment of the Ministry of Tribal Affairs and Panchayati Raj; the judgment re-affirms the authority of Gram Sabha in those villages to decide whether to allow mining in their ancestral holy lands or not.

Two decades have passed since the Constitution of India gave mandates to panchayats as the first tier of governance. Over this period, the hardware of local democracy has been largely set up; elections to three tiers of panchayats are being held, and panchayat bhawans (offices) have been constructed in most states. Yet, the software of local democracy has not been infused even after two decades. The human and institutional capacities of panchayati raj institutions are still inadequate, and the culture of participatory democracy is yet to take roots. There is no political movement yet for strengthening panchayats as building blocks of democracy in India.

This calls for a coalescing of various actors which constitute the wider fraternity of panchayati raj in the country; political leaders, civil society activists, media persons, sympathetic officials and others have to find a way to create the much needed political momentum for re-energising panchayati raj; if the present state of affairs is allowed to continue for some more time, citizens will lose hope and interest in local democracy in this country.

Rajesh Tandon     April 25, 2013