For participatory development

Interview with Mani Shankar Aiyar, Union Minister for Panchayati Raj.

The functioning of the three-tier panchayati raj institutions that were put in place in the mid-1990s following the 73rd amendment of the Constitution has come up for review. The Union Ministry of Panchayati Raj, which began the exercise in June 2004, a month after the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government was sworn in, has come up with fresh initiatives to refurbish these institutions with a view to making them more effective in bringing about economic development and social justice at the grassroots level through a democratic process, as envisaged by the Constitution. Mani Shankar Aiyar, Union Minister of Petroleum and Panchayati Raj, had seven rounds of talks with State Ministers of Panchayats within 150 days to identify the issues that confront these institutions and suggest steps to enable them to fulfil their constitutional responsibilities. The ministerial interactions have resulted in 150 "consensual conclusions" covering a whole range of issues pertaining to local self-government.

Armed with the national consensus that has evolved, he is at present visiting every State "to see whether we can persuade the States to fulfil in both letter and spirit the scheme of the participatory development that has been set out in the Constitution." He began the first of such visits, to Karnataka, on April 29. In an interview he gave S. Viswanathan on the morning of May 1 as he drove to Kolar in Karnataka to interact with the elected members and heads of the panchayati raj institutions in the district, Mani Shankar Aiyar, for whom panchayati raj is more than a passion, said: "These institutions have come into existence through a democratic process and now there are well entrenched in about two and a half lakh village panchayats, about 6,000 intermediate panchayats and about 500 district panchayats around the country."

The system had become irreversible and this was the first major achievement, Mani Shankar Aiyar said. The second achievement, according to him, is the fact that not less than one-third of the approximately 30 lakh elected representatives in the panchayats and the nagarpalikas are women, thanks to the reservation for women introduced for the first time in the country. The third "very major achievement", in the Minister's perception, is that substantial space has been reserved for the Schedules Castes (S.C.) and the Scheduled Tribes (S.T.), and one-third of the seats so reserved have been provided for S.C. and S.T. women.

"These are three truly historic achievements and since they cannot be reversed, we might say that in these three senses we have brought about a major galactic change in society," Mani Shankar Aiyar said. "However, our progress towards fulfilling the objectives for which these institutions have been brought into existence has been most unsatisfactory," he said. "I would say that we have genuine institutions of panchayati raj but we are far from having genuine panchayati raj." Hence the present attempt to rejuvenate the system through an action plan.

Excerpts from the interview:

What are the major functions that the Constitution envisages for the panchayati raj institutions that came into being following the 73rd Constitution Amendment Act, 1993?

The functions of these institutions have been clearly spelt out in Article 243G of the Constitution, read with Article 243 ZD and the 11th Schedule. These are supposed to be genuine institutions of local self-government, not adjuncts to the implementing agencies of State governments. The Constitution, which describes them as institutions of local self-government, says that this [status] is [given to them] for two specific purposes: planning for economic development and social justice and implementing these plans. Moreover, it says that this process of empowering them through devolution in order to enable them to plan and implement their own programmes of neighbourhood economic development and social justice will be governed by the laws of the legislatures of the States. The Constitution says in the 11th Schedule that this empowerment shall relate or could relate to the 29 subjects listed in the Schedule. Any form of panchayati raj that falls short of this cannot be described as genuine panchayati raj.

How can this be remedied?

It is written in the Constitution. Article 243 ZD provides for District Planning Committees [DPC] comprising representatives elected by the district panchayat and the nagarpalikas in a given district. It goes on to say that the function of this DPC is to "consolidate" but not to prepare the district plan. They are to consolidate the plans that have been made by each village panchayat for the village and, by each intermediary panchayat for the intermediary level, which is described differently in different States, as taluk or block or union. For district planning, separately, the nagarpalikas are also equally required to do the planning for their respective areas, be it town panchayats or municipalities. All these different plans are to be brought together in the DPC where they are to be "consolidated" into a draft district.

Article 243 ZD provides that these will be consolidated not into a district plan but into a draft district plan. So, why should anyone feel threatened if asked: "Do they have the technical ability to be able to do so difficult a task as planning?" The answer given by the Constitution is, "Please don't worry. They are not going to prepare the district plan, they are going to prepare only a draft plan." But that draft plan will be based upon the felt needs of the people who live in that district. That will also be based upon, obviously, the local natural and other resources. And, you will be able to see even from the quality of the village plan or the intermediary plan that it reflects the existing accepted capacity of the people of that district. Therefore, there should be no apprehension on anyone's part that these plans are going to lead us off the rails when it comes to economic development. On the contrary, economic development will start reflecting the wishes and aspirations of the people who are supposed to be the beneficiaries of the planning process, instead of the perceived wishes and aspirations of those who sit in Yojna Bhavan and have perhaps never seen a village.

By way of capacity building, Article 243 ZD provides for a large proportion of the members of the DPC to be nominated by the State government. But, if the State government draws upon local human resources, such as college teachers, ex-servicemen, retired civil servants, retired engineers or even serving ones, doctors, serving or retired, then the community and its best representatives, including businessmen, get involved in the process of developing their own district, because, after all, who can have a greater vested interest in the economic development of a neighbourhood than those who live in that neighbourhood? What we talk about is participatory planning for grassroots development. The best way of securing this is through grassroots democracy. So, it is the marrying together of the political process with the welfare of the people. And, obviously, if the people themselves have had such a major role to play in determining the route map for their own destiny, then if you address to them the execution of the plan that they have themselves prepared, you then fulfil the next objective of Article 243 G, which is, in addition to planning, they should be implementing the plan in the entrusted route. So, if they are entrusted with (implementing) the programmes that they themselves have prepared and which have been vetted at some other technical, senior levels, in the finalisation of the district plan, you get participatory development.

How can panchayati raj institutions be encouraged to take to the path of participatory development?

I am now engaged in visiting each and every State to see whether we can persuade the States to fulfil in both letter and spirit the scheme of the participatory development that has been set out in the Constitution. Karnataka is the first State I am visiting. But, you know, I am undertaking it nearly a year after I became the Minister concerned. It is not that I have been doing nothing in the year that has passed. What I felt was that in the first instance we need to have complete consensus between the State governments and the Centre on what needs to be done to the States for this purpose. There is no point in issuing directives from the Centre, because the constitutional scheme does not allow the Centre to impose its will on the States. Panchayati raj is quite definitely included in the State List. We have to respect the federal structure under which panchayati raj falls under the constitutional responsibility of the Centre and the legislative responsibility of the States. So, bearing in mind this fundamental constitutional principle, I suggested to the panchayati raj ministries in the States in June 2004, less than a month after I took over, that we might identify jointly the different dimensions of panchayati raj, and then, by holding a series of round-table talks, come to consensual conclusions on what is the way forward. In this process we identified 18 dimensions of panchayati raj and had seven sessions of round-table talks at seven regional centres across the country [Kolkata, Mysore, Raipur, Chandigarh, Srinagar, Guwahati and Jaipur], within the next 150 days. In each round we discussed the matters for two or three days and arrived at consensual conclusions. And I was, I think even the Prime Minister was, pleasantly surprised to find that in these seven rounds of ministerial talks we arrived at approximately 150 conclusions relating to the 18 identified dimensions. A compendium of these consensual conclusions was prepared and it was adopted in the last round table held in December 2004 in Jaipur.

These 150 recommendations cover the following different aspects of panchayati raj, which include effective devolution of functions, functionaries and finances, and the role of the gram sabha. One needs to understand that whereas elections to Parliament and State legislatures are meant for electing representatives for legislative bodies, elections to panchayats and local bodies are for electing executive authorities who need to be controlled by a kind of legislative process. Gram sabhas and the ward sabhas provide for that process. And where you do not have these sabhas functioning effectively, you cannot have effective panchayarti raj; you merely get decentralisation of corruption. So, the role of the gram sabha was discussed. We discussed in detail Article 243G with regard to planning and implementation. And we also took up at the same time in Mysore the Prime Minister's idea of rural business hubs. That was an entirely new dimension of panchayati raj, for which the credit must go to the Prime Minister. In Raipur we discussed the entire range of questions relating to reservation for women and S.C.s and S.T.s. Another issue that came up for discussion and decision related to the Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas Act, otherwise known as PESA, which, the Constitution says, should be Central legislation to be implemented by the States. In our fourth round table, in Chandigarh, we discussed two very unrelated matters: one, panchayati raj in the Union Territories, which is the Central government's responsibility, and second, jurisprudence. Jurisprudence has become a very important but highly technical matter that needs to be investigated, because we have before us over 1,000 judgments from courts at different levels, some of which are prima facie contradictory to one another. So, harmonising jurisprudence on panchayati raj has emerged over the last decade as a crucial requirement. We moved on to the fifth round table to Srinagar where there were two very fundamental issues discussed. One, the preparation by every State and the Union government of annual State of the Panchayats Reports for presentation to their respective legislatures and through this, the basis of a development index, which is again a highly complicated technical matter and requires a great deal of very careful study. Then we went on to Guwahati where we discussed the experience we had in holding elections and in preparation for that we requested the Election Commissioner of Rajasthan to convene a meeting of the Commission. It is on the basis of its recommendations on what is to be done to make elections free, fair, clean and transparent that we made our recommendations. We also involved, in the Guwahati meeting, the former Comptroller and Auditor-General of India, V.K. Shunglu, and the Institute of Public Accountants, and between the two of them we had a very good technical preparation for a political-level round-table discussion on audit and accounts and social audit. It seemed to us that only by taking all these Acts together that we shall be able to end corruption in panchayati raj, which is the single most and, unfortunately, valid criticism that is directed against these institutions.

Finally, at the Jaipur meeting, we took up issues such as I.T. [Information Technology]-enabled governance in panchayati raj institutions as well as the one subject that is obsessively mentioned in relation to panchayati raj but to which I deliberately said, we would take up last, which is training and capacity building. It seems to me that while training and capacity building are very important, we cannot use this as an excuse to stall panchayati raj. Unfortunately, the Central and State governments have thus far been inclined to stall devolution on the grounds that the people are illiterate and so cannot possibly understand these complex matters of governance. This sounds to me exactly like something I have heard before. We heard it from Lord Minto [a Viceroy of India] and Lord Morley [a Secretary of State for Indian Affairs of the British Government], in [the] 1909 [Minto-Morley Reforms]. They said that Indians were incapable of governing themselves and therefore over a period of time there would be capacity building and training of Indians to make them fit for self-governance. And that was how the system of dyarchy came in under the Government of India Act, 1919, and then very limited devolution of power under the Government of India Act, 1935. Why do we have this colonial attitude towards our own people? The best form of capacity building and training is hands-on training in the institutions themselves, and from what I have seen of panchayati raj in the last 12 years, our elected representatives and the officials, some of whom are most deserving, have learnt much more about panchayati raj as the result of running panchayati raj institutions than attending training courses in different institutes all over the country.

I found that there was complete agreement at the talks. There were points that were made that did not occur to others. These were incorporated. There were other points that were modified after discussion. I used to dictate the conclusions at the end of the discussion in the presence of everybody concerned. As I went along dictating these, sometimes while I was speaking, sometimes after I sat down, there would be amendments moved by the participants. And we had 100 per cent agreement. But, because this agreement was at the level of the panchayati raj Ministers and we, the panchayati raj Ministers, do not generally have a very high standing in the governments that we represent, I went completely silent for about three months, after we had circulated these conclusions to the Chief Ministers of all the States and the Home Ministers of the Union Territories. I was waiting for the other levels of the government or higher levels of the government to register their objections to what we, the panchayati raj Ministers, had agreed by consensus. I am utterly delighted to say that after three months of waiting I have not received a single objection.

Now that there has been consensus between the Centre and the States on the areas to be covered, what is the next part of your agenda?

We can now proceed with the conversion of the road map of the Panchayati Raj Ministry into an action plan where it has to measure its own performance against the objectives that it has itself laid down. There is no imposition of the Centre's will in this matter. We have agreed that this is what we need to do to move from having genuine institutions of panchayati raj to having genuine panchayati raj. That is why I have started this series of tours here in Karnataka. At the rate of one State a month, I hope to cover all the 24 States in two fiscal years from now. I am sure that as we go along we go on building up [panchayati raj] because whatever conclusions we arrive at in Karnataka, I intend to circulate these to all the State governments. So, by practice I think we can improve the nature of these visits and the effectiveness of the conclusions that are drawn. This way I think we shall be able to, over a period of time, slowly but solidly move from genuine institutions of panchayati raj to genuine panchayati raj.

When one looks at the specifics of the consensus recommendations on IT-enabled governance, audit and accounts, including social audit, and the provisions for the devolution of functions according to activity mapping, one will get a holistic view of how we can actually ensure that funds for panchayati raj do not get delayed for that month. What is sad at the moment is that the quantum of these funds, whether they come from the Centre or from the States, is so limited. For example, here in Karnataka, which has a reputation of having just about the best-run pachayati raj system in the country, I was shocked to discover that at the village level the devolution of funds of an untied nature from the State government is effectively only about Rs. 2 lakhs to 2.5 lakhs a year for each village panchayat. Because, while in theory Rs.5 lakhs are to be devolved, the panchayat's payment dues in respect of electricity bill dues are cut from the devolved funds before the money is passed on. So, if you took the components of the devolution of funds from the State, the SGRY [Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana], which is the latest version of the Jawahar Rozgar Yojna started by Rajiv Gandhi in 1989, and the provisions of the 11th Finance Commission, the village panchayat is supposed to get about Rs. 9 lakhs and ends up getting about Rs. 5 lakhs. With Rs. 5 lakhs, of which only half is untied, how much planning can they do? How many of the projects can they implement? And to what extent can they function as institutions of local self-government? Very little. Fortunately, after the orders have now been issued in Karnataka for 2005-2006, it looks as if there is going to be a very substantial increase in the funds provided to panchayati raj institutions. The broader lesson I would draw is that in all States we need to give priority to activity mapping so that everyone knows exactly what needs to be done at the village, intermediate and district levels and then to pattern the devolution of finances and functionaries according to the same activity map. It is only when this is fully understood and implemented that we shall get the devolution of the three Fs [functions, finances, functionaries] without which, of course, there can be no panchayati raj.

The Common Minimum Programme of the UPA has stated that the UPA government will ensure that all funds given to the States for implantation of poverty alleviation and rural development schemes by panchayats are neither delayed nor diverted. There have been frequent complaints from panchayati raj institutions that devolution of funds is delayed or the allotted funds get diverted.

There is some element of delay and diversion, which varies from State to State and therefore has to be discussed with the States. But what we obviously need is the injection of far larger sums of money, as far as possible untied, based on the Kerala pattern all over the country. The Centre also must raise its funds up to at least 20,000 crores of rupees of untied funds, at which point the devolution will become meaningful. And meaningful devolution will be the most effective way of ensuring the NCMP objective of no delay and no diversion.

What do you mean by the Kerala pattern?

The Kerala pattern is that approximately Rs.30 lakhs a year is made available on time to the village panchayats, which do their own planning. The people at large are heavily involved in this planning process. Therefore there is a greater sense of involvement in the panchayati raj movement. But I would like to reserve my detailed comments on this until I have been to Kerala. My visit to Kerala is scheduled for November this year.

Most of the States are not inclined to part with many of the 29 subjects, the devolution of which to the panchayats has been envisaged in the Constitutuion...

Even here in Karnataka, I take it as the example because this is the first and, as far as I know, the only State in the Union to have incorporated the beginnings of the activity mapping in its legislation itself. The Karnataka Panchayat Raj Act, 1993, broadly provides for what activities are to be undertaken at the three different levels. But then, the operationalisation of this legislative provision, even after 12 years, is largely incomplete. They may have made a major administrative decision in the Cabinet about it in 2004, which is now getting reflected in the State's Budget 2005-2006. So, we will watch how the implementation goes, but in effect we need to have complete activity mapping and then, based on that pattern, we can devolve the functions and functionaries. In Karnataka, the biggest resistance, in fact, is from the functionaries. It is also on the finance side. So, we may find that we arrive at the nexus between the three Fs over a period of time. Their functions get devolved first, their finances next and then finally their functionaries. But, to ensure really that functionaries serve the panchayati raj institutions, we have made a recommendation that in every district there should be a district panchayati administration service and that the higher levels of the civil service can, as far as possible, be removed from development functions. They can do the other jobs they are supposed to do, such as revenue administration and the maintenance of law and order, and allow a cadre of the technical and administrative officers to grow with the panchayati raj system and serve panchayati raj institutions in the same way in which the civil service serves the elected institutions at the State level. The anomaly of the civil service regarding itself as being superior to the elected members and the elected members - that is even worse - regarding the civil service as superior to themselves. Until that goes, until that mindset is changed, we cannot really have institutions of self-government in the full sense of the term.

How best the bureaucratic control over the system be removed or reduced?

Unless we marginalise the bureaucracy at the district and sub-district levels and bring people and people's representatives centre stage, we cannot have participatory development. After 60 years of development in total, development in which the people, the beneficiaries, become recipients and not participants in the process is the least efficient way of bringing prosperity to the grassroots and it is there that we need to concentrate. I think the last general elections held a very important lesson that if you focus on the urban middle class and the kind of indices of development that The Wall Street Journal approves of, then you may succeed in getting the plaudits of certain sections of metropolitan India and the rest of the world, but you will not get the support of the people of India. You have to keep the aam aadmi [layman] at the centre of governance. And the only way of bringing the aam aadmi to the centre of governance is through panchayati raj institutions. Whatever their defects, panchayati raj institutions are the only instruments available to get the most aam of the aam aadmi involved in the governance of the neighbourhood and development issues.

And to my mind the most inspiring example that I have come across was a lady I met at a meeting organised by the Hunger Project in New Delhi a few months ago. She very proudly announced that she was illiterate, that she belonged to the Scheduled Caste and that she was a woman, and had been elected the leader of her panchayat in a general constituency. She defeated a non-Scheduled Caste male candidate, because the people of that village felt that she was far more dedicated to the development and welfare of the neighbourhood than those who are lauded in Delhi as having capacity, not requiring training. That was real empowerment and I try to keep her as a symbol of successful panchayati raj. Incidentally she is from Bihar. So, if in a State like Bihar an illiterate S.C. woman can be chosen by the people in a general constituency, there is hope for panchayati raj. And where there is scope for panchayati raj there is hope for the country, because as Gandhiji said, "No poorna swaraj until we have gram swaraj."