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Panchayati Raj and Watershed Management in India: Constraints and Opportunities

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Panchayati Raj and Watershed Management in India: Constraints and Opportunities Working Paper 114 PANCHAYATI RAJ AND WATERSHED MANAGEMENT IN INDIA: CONSTRAINTS AND OPPORTUNITIES PARI BAUMANN December 1998 Overseas Development Institute Portland House Stag Place London SW1E 5DP 2 3 Acknowledgements This report is based largely on interviews with representatives from the Government, Panchayati Raj Institutions, NGOs, Self-help Groups and Academic Institutions. I would like to thank all of the respondents for the generous amounts of time they spared to discuss their experiences of Panchayati Raj and Watershed Development with me. I would like to thank Ashok Kumar of Development Alternatives in Bangalore for accompanying me on the visit to Gram Panchayats in Tumkur District. I would like to thank Write Arm in Bangalore for their logistical support in Bangalore, and for providing an inviting base from which to plan the work. Thank you also to Janet Seeley and Peter Reid, of the Rural Development Office of the Department for International Development in New Delhi, for suggesting contacts for interviews and for their interest in the study. 4 Contents Summary 6 Acronyms 9 1 Introduction 10 1.1 Introduction 10 1.2 Background 10 1.3 The terms of reference and research methodology 11 2 The legal framework and historical background 12 2.1 Brief outline of the new policies 12 2.2 Panchayati Raj and the 73rd Constitutional Amendment 12 2.3 State planning and the Guidelines 16 2.4 The research question 17 3 Decentralisation: the spirit and the letter of the law 19 3.1 Different types of decentralisation 19 3.2 Decentralisation in practice 21 3.2.1 Decentralisation in the 73rd Constitutional Amendment 21 3.2.2 Decentralisation and the Guidelines 23 3.3 Summary 25 4 Institutional change, cooperation and conflict 26 4.1 Institutional failure 26 4.2 Collaboration between the state, NGOs and civil society institutions 27 4.3 The process of institutional transition 30 4.4 Conflict and collaboration in the implementation of the Guidelines 31 4.5 Summary: the political settlement 36 5 Collective action and empowerment 38 5.1 The community and development in Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines 38 Collective action and empowerment in Panchayati Raj 41 5.3 Collective action and empowerment in the Guidelines 43 5.4 Summary 44 6 The project interface between Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines: constraints and potentials 45 6.1 The operation of the system from the state to the district 45 6.2 The intermediaries: NGOs, PIAs and PRIs 48 6.3 Gram Panchayats and community based watershed institutions 50 6.4 Equity in PRIs and WIs 54 6.5 Summary: roles and functions of Gram Panchayats and WIs 56 7 Accountability and sustainability in Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines 59 7.1 Accountability and transparency 59 7.2 Sustainability and ‘scaling-up’ 63 7.3 Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka: a comparison 64 5 8 Summary and future potential 66 8.1 Summary 66 8.2 Further research and institutional links 68 Appendix 1 Conclusions of the working group on Panchayati Raj and watershed development as presented by the moderator Dr. Rathin Roy at the conference on Watershed Approaches to Wasteland Development, Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi 70 Appendix 2 Main features of the 73rd Amendment 72 Appendix 3 Enabling provisions regarding tax assignments/fees, tax sharing and grants-in-aid in respect of Panchayati Raj Institutions 73 Appendix 4 List of interviewees 75 References 77 6 Summary This report examines the institutional links between Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines for watershed development that were issued by the Ministry for Rural Areas and Employment in New Delhi. Panchayati Raj is a three-tier system of local government, which became a constitutional part of democracy in India in 1993. The Guidelines were issued to rationalise the approaches and delivery mechanisms of various watershed development programs and provide them with a common framework. The Guidelines are widely accepted as being unprecedented in their emphasis on involving local people and providing them with the necessary autonomy to develop their watersheds. This report examines four particular issues in the links between the two systems • The philosophy and objectives of these bodies with respect to watershed development. • The difference in roles and modes of operation between the two bodies and how the balance of power between these is established. • The nature of the linkages – both formal and informal – between watershed institutions and political bodies. • The mechanisms that exist for ensuring the transparency and accountability of these institutions at the district, block and village levels. (Terms of Reference, 1998). On the philosophy and objectives • The 73rd Amendment and the Watershed Guidelines are entirely different legal entities. The Guidelines, as an executive order of a Ministry, are subordinate to the 73rd Constitutional Amendment. Panchayati Raj Institutions at all levels have full statutory powers. Watershed Institutions have no statutory powers and no authority that is independent of the project (section 3.2.2 and section 6.4) • Decentralisation of development planning and implementation are central objectives of both Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines. However they are based on fundamentally different notions of decentralisation (section 3.1), state-society interaction (section 4) and collective action in the community (section 5). • The concept of the community and empowerment differs in Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines. The 73rd Amendment reserves seats for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and women at all three tiers of Panchayati Raj Institutions. The objective is to bring socially and economically weaker segments of the community into mainstream politics and ensure that their priorities are incorporated into development planning and implementation. The Guidelines make normative recommendations on reservations for women and scheduled castes but do not enforce these in the various tiers of Watershed Institutions (section 5) • All of the respondents, without exception, believed that the 73rd Amendment is progressive and that Panchayati Raj Institutions are the most important and sustainable local institution. However the respondents differed on whether or not Panchayati Raj Institutions are ready to 7 take on the responsibilities of development planning. Approximately half of the respondents felt that full responsibilities should be given to PRIs at once, as the constitution requires. The other half felt that PRIs were not ready and that a transferral of responsibility would have to be preceded by progress on literacy, land reforms, and empowerment of socially and economically disadvantaged (section 5.1 and section 5.2). • There is a large gap between the spirit of the legislation and practice in both Panchayati Raj and the Guidelines (section 3.3 and section 7.1). On the roles and balance of power: • Panchayati Raj Institutions and Watershed Institutions created by the Guidelines overlap in several of the areas of responsibility prescribed in the Amendment and the Guidelines (section 3.2.2 and section 6.4). • There is a fundamental confusion over the respective roles and responsibilities of PRIs and Watershed Institutions. These emerge when the PRIs are treated as an implementation mechanism for projects rather than as a unit of local self-government. The functions of the two are in fact perfectly compatible once the different roles of the two systems are appreciated (section 6.4). In particular, Panchayati Raj Institutions can play an important role in ‘scaling- up’ watershed management (section 7.2). • The balance of power between PRIs and Watershed Institutions at district and block level is dependent on the wider policy environment and the progress taken on merging Zilla Parishads with District Rural Development Agencies. The balance of power between Gram Panchayats and Watershed Committees depends not only on the policy environment but also on the particular constellation of power in the village, and on the approach taken by project implementing agencies (sections 6.1 and 6.3). • Many of the respondents mentioned that development planning at the moment is in a transition phase. The transition will have costs and benefits for the state administration, NGOs, PRI representatives and groups within local communities. It is important to evaluate these, and the political positions which the costs and benefits give rise to. The transition cannot be treated as a purely technical question of which institutions are most appropriate for different purposes (section 4.4). On the nature of the formal and informal linkages: • In Karnataka the Guidelines are being implemented by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and his subordinate staff in the Zilla Panchayat. The role of the elected members is formally a supervisory one. However the power relations between the elected President and the Chief Executive Officer are interdependent. Many respondents mentioned that the implementation of development projects is dependent on the informal links that exist between the Adhyaksha of the Zilla Panchayat and the CEO. In Andhra Pradesh there is almost no interaction, formal or informal, between the DRDAs and the Zilla Praja Parishads for watershed management (section 6.1). 8 • The links between the Panchayati Raj Institutions and Watershed Institutions are most apparent at the village level. The boundaries between the two types of institutions are very permeable, with local élites often dominating both. However, many disadvantaged members of Self-help Groups and Watershed Committees, in particular women, have been encouraged by NGOs to contest Gram Panchayat elections. Conversely, in Andha Pradesh the recent Watershed Committee elections were contested on party political lines. The links between the two systems therefore, need to be considered in the broader context of local politics and local power bases (sections 6.3 and 6.4). On the mechanisms for transparency and accountability: • The mechanisms for ensuring transparency and accountability are weak in Panchayati Raj. The respondents all stressed that the Gram Sabha is the single most important body in Panchayati Raj and that the system will not work properly until the Gram Sabha can demand accountability (section 7.1).
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